■ At 



\ 



ORIGIN 



OF THE 



Four Gospels. 



B Y 



CONSTANTINO TISCHENDORF, 

PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF LEIPZIG: 



TRANSLATED, UNDER THE AUTHORS SANCTION, BY 

WILLIAM L. GAGE. 



'tt 



h, 



FROM THE FOURTH GERMAN EDITION, 

REVISED AND GREATLY ENLARGED. 







LONDON: O 
JACKSON, WALFORD, & HODDER. 

1868. 




TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 



-~— 6f 

fuT was a pleasant, sunny morning in May of 
| last year, when I called at the modest house 
in* Leipzig where the world-renowned Pro- 
fessor Teschendorf makes his home. It lies in 
a quiet, pleasant part of the city, away from 
its narrow streets, with their tall, grim, gaunt, gray 
buildings, some of them centuries old, away from 
the quaint churches, the castellated and fantastic 
Rath Haus, or City Hall, as we should call it, away 
from the places which Bach, and Mendelssohn, 
and Goethe, and Dr. Faustus used to frequent, and 
in the new and cheerful streets of the New Town. 
For Leipzig grows like an American city ; its an- 
cient limits no longer hold it in, but it is shooting 
away into the country on all sides, and turning the 
battle-field where Xapoleon received his first great 
shock, into densely-built streets and squares. One 
would almost think that a paleographist like Tisch- 
endorf, a man whose life-work is the exhuming of 
lost and buried manuscripts and the making out 
of their cpntents, would choose for his home one 

3 



4 TRANSLATOR'S P HE FACE. 

of those old, weather-beaten, gaunt houses in the 
heart of the city; but when I saw the man, I could 
detect at a glance that it was not his nature to m 
choose anything less free, pleasant, and cheery 
than those suburban streets, and their modern, 
sunny houses. 

I did not venture to call upon this eminent man 
for the mere gratification of a natural curiosity, but 
for the purpose of ascertaining one or two facts 
which I needed for a note to Hitter's work on the 
Holy Land, which I was then editing and translat- 
ing. As Hitter had been a near and valued friend 
of Tischendorf, it was a matter of great satisfaction 
to the latter that an American had proposed to 
give to the people of England and the United 
States a version of the works of that great and ex- 
cellent man ; and no welcome could be more cor- 
dial than Tischendorf extended. He is by no 
means the old, smoke-dried, bad-mannered, garru- 
lous, ill-dressed, and offensively dirty man, who of- 
ten answers in Germany to the title of Professor. 
On the contrary, Tischendorf is a man looking 
young and florid, though probably hard upon sixty. 
I have seen many a man of forty whose face is 
more worn, and whose air is older, than that of this 
greatest of German scholars. Nor has he at all 
that shyness which a life in the study is almost 
sure to engender ; he is free, open, genial, and has 
the manner of a gentleman who has traveled 
largely, and who is thoroughly familiar with society. 



TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 

And if there is more than a tinge of vanity in 
his talk, if he does not weary of speaking of his 
own works, his own exploits, his own hopes and 
purposes and successes, we only feel that he can 
not praise himself more than the world is glad to 
praise him, and that all the * eulogies which he 
passes upon himself are no more hearty than those 
which all the great scholars of the age have lavished 
upon him. 

Teschendorf, like all really great men, is as ap- 
proachable as a child, and is not obliged to confine 
his conversation to learned subjects. He does not 
speak English at all, but will give his English or 
American visitor the choice of five languages, — - 
Greek, Latin, Italian, French, and German. In all 
of these he is at home, speaking the first four not 
in any stiff, pedantic way, but with grace and 
fluency. Yet he loves best his mother tongue, of 
course. In talking, his countenance lights up 
pleasantly, his style becomes sprightly, his action 
vivacious, he jumps up, runs across the room to 
fetch a book or document or curiosity, enters into 
his guest's affairs, speaks warmly of friends, and 
evidently enjoys with great zest his foreign reputa- 
tion. Of two Americans he spoke with great 
warmth, — Prof. H. B. Smith of Xew York, and 
Prof. Day of Xew Haven. His relations with the 
great English scholars and divines are very inti- 
mate ; and archbishops and deans and civil digni- 
taries of the highest rank are proud to enjoy 



6 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 

the friendship of this great and genial German 
scholar. 

Teschendorf gave me with his own lips the ac- 
count, which in its printed form # is so well known, 
of his discovery of the ancient Sinaitic Bible. He 
told me of his three separate journeys to the con- 
vent at the foot of Mount Sinai in search of ancient 
manuscripts ; of the bringing to light, at his first 
visit, of large fragments of the Bible as well as of 
valuable apocryphal documents ; of his discovery 
in 1853, at his second visit, of only eleven ad- 
ditional lines from the book of Genesis ; of the ob- 
stacles put in his way, the great liberality of the 
Russian government, the help afforded him by 
eminent princes, and the success which finally at- 
tended him, when, in the autumn of 1859, he was 
able to return from Cairo to St. Petersburg and 
lay the original manuscript of the Sinaitic Bible 
in the hands of the Emperor of Russia. It is one 
of the oldest written documents extant; dating 
back to the fourth century, about the time of the 
first Christian Emperor. No wonder that the 
night on which Tischendorf made this great dis- 
covery he was unable to sleep for joy, and danced 
in his room for very excitement. 

Have any of my readers ever read Freytag's 
masterly romance entitled "The Lost Manuscript "? 

* Given in the Massachusetts Sabbath School Society's recent pub- 
lication of Teschendorf's little work for popular reading, ''When 
were our Gospels written ? " 



TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. * 7 

It seems to me that he has embodied in this work, 
which is one of the finest products of German gen- 
ius, very much of the feeling which such men as 
Teschendorf experience in pursuing such investiga- 
tions, and in coming to such results as this. But 
more momentous by far in its relations to the hu- 
man race is the search for an ancient Bible than 
that for a lost Tacitus ; the one the record of a 
nation's decline and ruin, the other the promise of 
a world's restoration ! 

During our interview, Prof. Tischendorf told me 
that he was then re-writing his work " When were 
our Gospels written ? " making it a book for schol- 
ars instead of for popular readers, and enlarging 
it to three times its original size. He believed 
that both works were needed, in England and 
America no less than in Germany, and suggested 
to me to undertake the translation of the larger 
work. I promised to do so at my earliest leisure, 
and the result is now before the public. The name 
of the work I have ventured to change. In the 
German it bears the same title with the smaller 
sketch, "When were our Gospels written?" but 
fearing lest some should suppose that the two 
books are almost identical, merely different issues 
of the same work, it has seemed no violence to 
give the treatise the name, " Origin of the Four 
Gospels." The learned author has not succeeded 
in throwing his materials together in a way to at- 
tract hasty readers ; his style is in this work rather 



8 TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 

heavy, hard, and disjointed; but great, invaluable 
facts are there; and there is no lack of a clear, 
well-poised, thoroughly guarded critical judgment, 
sound faith, and earnest purpose. If our Chris- 
tian public at large have reason to be grateful 
for the publication of the little work of Tischen- 
clorf, our clergymen, theological students, and pro- 
fessors have no less cause to thank the great Leip- 
zig scholar for furnishing them with this armory 
of bright, keen weapons to be employed in the 
overthrow of unbelief. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE, 



-3^=gfc!oo 




l^HEX in January. 1S65. 1 set my hand to the 
task of preparing a work which should 
1 2 . o solve for the satisfaction of cultivated read- 
;;/ ers no less than of thorough scholars the 
question of the genuineness of our Gospels. — a 
question which stands related in the closest man- 
ner to the great topic of the present age. the Life 
of Jesus. — I was fully aware that those theologians 
who have for some time brought the scourge of 
their skeptical and unbelieving theories upon the 
field of New-Testament scholarship would take 
great offense at my work, and express themselves 
strongly against it. For who does not know that 
these men have long forgotten how to subject their 
prejudices to the results of conscientious investiga- 
tion? Equally well known is it that they are ac- 
customed to regard nothing; as having; scholarlv 
and scientific value unless it proceeds from their 
own circle. On my part, however. I felt it to be 
my duty to take up arms against this organized 
movement to convert theological science into so- 

9 



10 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

phistry, and give powerful support to the anti- 
Christian spirit of our time ; to meet "it with the 
results of rigid inquiry, and with the earnestness 
of convictions which have matured from a lifetime 
consecrated faithfully to Christian learning. It 
seemed to be only in this way that I could advance 
the sacred interests which I had at heart, and throw 
light upon the questions which are vitally con- 
nected with belief in the Lord. 

Did I Expect to escape contradiction and the 
anger of opponents ? By no means. Others might 
hesitate about committing themselves absolutely 
to a service in behalf of the interests of truth, fear- 
ing to encounter the sharp thrusts which might be 
directed against them ; but I believed that I ought 
to and must cherish no such fear, and solaced myself 
with the thought that it would be a hard matter if 
what I might suffer from the calumny of enemies 
were not offset by the approbation of those who 
believe in the purity of my intentions and the up- 
rightness of my aim. I have not been disappointed 
in this. The displeasure of my opponents has been 
manifested in a shameless manner. But, on the 
other hand, there has not been wanting the satis- 
faction of seeing my little book received in many 
quarters with the warmest acceptance and heartiest 
recognition, as well out of Germany as in it. In 
France, Holland, England, Russia, and America, 
translations have appeared; even an Italian one 
was made at Rome. Yet opposition has at no sin- 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 11 

gle moment failed to display its real character; the 
weapons of lying, persecution, and calumny have 
been brought to bear against me ; and in so doing:, 
the blind zeal which has been displayed has at 
times suffered the grossest ignorance to peep out. 

Two men in particular have undertaken the task 
of assailing my work with the weapons mentioned 
above, — Dr. Hilgenfeld, of Jena, and Dr. Yolkmar, 
of Zurich. The first has devoted to this task an 
article in the Review which he edits, heading it, 
" Constantine Tischendorf as Defensor Fidei." As 
examples of the disingenuous statements with 
which he figures [strotzt], I adduce the following. 
Although in my work my main task was with the 
canon of the four Gospels ; although I in no place 
undertook to put the whole Xew-Testament canon 
on the same footing, as, indeed, no thorough scholar 
can do ; and although I do not speak specifically 
of the whole canon, and merely put together as of 
equal canonicity the four Gospels, the Pauline 
Epistles, the first of John, and the first of Peter, 
yet Hilgenfeld writes, p. 330 : " The cheering result 
which issues from this illustration of the subject is 
the fact that the four Gospels, and even the ichole 
canon of the Xew Testament, can be assigned to- 
the close of the first century." Page 333 : " Than 
the presupposition that the close of the Xew-Tes- 
tament canon fells at the end of the first century, 
nothing is more incompatible." Page 336 : u The 
modern apologist, who puts a full and fair ending 



12 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

of the New-Testament canon at the close of the 
first century." Is this legerdemain, or a purposed 
misleading of readers ? It is, it must be, one of the 
two. Naturally, he shuns quoting a single passage 
of my work in support of the charge which he 
brings against me. 1 

Page 333, note 2, Hilgenfeld, in commenting on 
Euseb. Hist. Eccl. hi. 392, and alluding to Papias, 
thus writes : " That the line of presbyters is opened 
here by the apostles, can only be more than doubt- 
ful with a critic like Tischendorf." But would any 
reader suspect from this that I was following the 
express declaration of Eusebius, to whom we are 
indebted for almost all our knowledge of Papias's 
book, and . to whose silence the negative school 
itself is indebted for its powerful evidence against 
John ? And that the " Defensor Fidei " is here in 
accord with the two heroes of the negative school 
— Strauss and Penan — has not the third hero of 
that school ignored this, or sought to whitewash it 
over ? 

On page 337, Hilgenfeld writes : "The 'honora- 
ble weapons ' on which Tischendorf prides himself 
are, for that matter, made very doubtful even in 
the homilies of Clemens Romanus." On this, he 
proceeds to quote my words [in the first edition of 
this book] : " It is of unabated interest that the al- 
leged and acutely argued cropping out of John's 
Gospel in this celebrated record of the Jewish- 

1 See notes in Appendix. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 13 

Christian tendency, based on the recent discovery 
by Dressel, at Rome, of the closing portion of the 
document, where there is an undoubted use of 
John's story of the man whose blindness was healed, 
— though it may be that the genial habit of skep- 
ticism will yield to no array of truth, — has entirely 
fallen out of sight." On this, he remarks : " As I, 
to whose critical investigations into the Gospels of 
Justin a note at this point refers, do not wish to 
hold Dr. Tischendorf to be a base calumniator, I 
must conclude that he has taken a twelve -years' 
slumber over the matter with which he is dealing. 
Dressel's complete edition of Clemens's Homilies, 
published in 1853, is for Tischendorf a book only 
'just out.' Then he rubs his eyes, and simply 
comes to the same conclusion that I came to fif- 
teen years ago, before the conclusion of the Homi- 
lies was brought to light." To this I answer, that 
my allusion to Hilgenfeld was coupled with the 
expression " acutely argued," and that it was ex- 
pressly stated that Hiigenfeld's words dated from 
1850; and when I had occasion to speak of Dres- 
sel's work as "new," I appended the date, 1853. 
Still some trace of his base calumniation must re- 
main. And Hilgenfeld draws my own words, 
" Though it mav be that the genial habit of skepti- 
cism will yield to no array of truth," down upon 
his own head. A glance shows that he is entitled 
to the full application of it ; and one may not hear 
of the " genial habit of skepticism " without seeing 



14 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

that Dr.'Hilgenfeld is alluded to. He acts as if he 
did not know that it is Dr. Volkmar who has so 
weakened his confession of a use of John's Gospel 
by the Clementines that the doubts respecting the 
authenticity of this Gospel remain undisturbed; and 
he writes : "But Teschendorf, although an honorable 
man in everything else, has in this instance been 
buried, with his critical knowledge, in the deepest 
slumber." Everywhere Hilgenfeld acts as if he be- 
lieved that all that he advances must be contested 
by me. I did not purpose to take him for the sub- 
ject of my book: he comes, as all can see, only un- 
der consideration so far as he follows in the direc- 
tion which I oppose. Does he leave this direction 
at any point, and under any circumstances, he be- 
gins to cry out about " dishonor," " going to sleep," 
" Spanish knight-errantry," and the like, as in page 
836, where says, " In him (Justin) I have long rec- 
ognized the use of the three first Gospels, and even 
the possibility of an acquaintance with the fourth. 
This puts Tischendorf in the attitude of spurring 
his Rosinante, Don Quixote-like, against wind- 
mills as imagined giants, in his zeal to show the 
use of the four Gospels by these apologists." The 
zeal of the Spanish knight lies in the following 
forcible words : " That Justin repeats our Matthew 
in many passages is undeniable ; that he knows and 
follows Mark and Luke, is in several places ex- 
tremely probable." 2 Then a page and a half are 
devoted to a discussion of the effort which has been 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 15 

made to discredit this universally accredited result : 
as much more follows respecting the use of John, 
neither exactly answerinsfto Hilo-enfeld's views about 
fighting against windmills. Looking back at his 
loose statements, specimens of which have here been 
given, and more familiar with the discovery of his 
dishonesty, the same pitiable "Theologus quern 
terrestres certe superi . . . extra ordinem theologi- 
cum arcuerunt " writes in his a X. T. extra canonem 
receptum," " Ceterum Tischendorfli argumenta 
qualia omnino sint iam diiudicavi et huius viri sub- 
dolam in impugn a ndis adversariis rationem palam 
detexi." In the same work he boldly continues 
the flow of his dishonest effusions, writing on page 
69, " Tischendorfium in famoso libello." . . . Page 
44 : " Calumniatoris partes agere, quasi negaremus 
Matth. evang. h. 1. laudari nemo non videt." But 
what is on that page 44 to which he refers ? !N"ot 
a word respecting him ; I only transcribed verbally 
what Volkmar wrote, where he prefaced his invec- 
tives against myself and others with the applause 
which he had received from Hilgenfeld and Strauss : 
"quod Ed. mea Esdras Prophet a?; . . . omnibus 
qui hucusque de ea re ex Ed. mea iudicarunt per- 
suasit, etiam Hilgenfeidio ; . . . et Straussio. . . . 
Reussium satis pigebit." Is not this to wear with- 
out shame the liar's brazen brow ? 

But Dr. Volkmar has surpassed even Hilgenfeld 
in the use of these weapons. I had occasion to 
show in my book, by a number of examples, that a 



16 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

great many trickeries had been employed for the 
purpose of discrediting the evidence borne by the 
second century to our Gospels. This evidence was 
in part put aside, where it could be, by bringing 
forward the testimony *of lost writings ; sometimes 
the witnesses were made more modern than they 
really were, and transformed from a decisive epoch 
to one without significance, so far as the matter 
under discussion is affected, while sometimes they 
were charged with ignorance or deceit : here the 
writings which gave evidence were regarded as 
not genuine, or at any rate as interpolated so far as 
to invalidate their testimony ; while there the senti- 
ments of ancient writers have all their pith taken 
out by falsification and perversion. All this is ef- 
fected by Volkmar with a skill that is unparalleled, 
so far as my modest knowledge enables me to 
judge. I ought not to refrain from giving some 
instances of his ways of proceeding. In respect to 
Herakleon, he writes, page 28 : " Tischendorf states, 
4 This man was reckoned by Origen as contempora- 
neous with Valentine, which is confirmed by Epiph- 
anius. 5 Yes, good God ; # but if this is made out, 
why waste another word upon it ? " On page 130 : 
" Far from belonging to the earlier disciples of Val- 
entine, he is one of the very last distinguished heads 
of that Gnosticism, and one who would recommend it 
to the Church : c. 190-195 on Luke, and c. 200-220 

* A familiar oatlx used by German divines, ladies, and other persons, 
and only less common than the hourly-repeated" Lord Jesus." Traxs. 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 17 

on John." Xow, on what does this assertion rest? 
First : ;i Orig;en onlv declares that Herakleon was 
accounted to be the friend of Valentine ; " page 23. 
Second: w; He was the chief opponent of the school 
of Valentine, unknown even to IrenaBus;" page 210, 
Third : c; This is confirmed by Epiphanins because 
diadr/cTcu. in his language, only refers to the fact 
that the Half-Valentinians are followed in chap. 41 
by the founder of Marcionitisin in this, my Pana- 
rion of all heresies." But with all this, he has 
sought in vain to falsify history. Following the 
lead of Dr. Lipsius, 3 whose heresiological investi- 
gallons Volkmar boasts that he has only continued 
with the greatest satisfaction to himself, he over- 
looks the passage in Irenaeus, Book ii. ch. 4 (not 
alluded to 4 in the index indeed), where Herakleon 
and Ptolemy are distinctly mentioned as well- 
known personages. Having made this unfortunate 
oversight, he advances confidently to weaken the 
force of yrojgiiwg in Origen, to explain the 8iads%sxai 
of Epiphanius in a joking fashion, and, lastly, to 
unearth in the fyjTeh&aav of Hippolytus a contempo- 
rary of Hippolytus between 200 and 220. Celsus 
encountered a similar fate. Respecting him, Volk- 
mar writes, page 80 : tt Of Celsus's work, it is noto- 
rious that it manifested acquaintance not only with 
the canonical, but with the apocryphal Gospels, 
and more particularly with that of John." " It is 
quite another matter to determine the epoch of 
Celsus" "Celsus wrote his book about the middle 
3 



18 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

of the second century." " Does not Origen say, at 
the close of his work, 8 : 76, that this Celsus an- 
nounced that he was intending to put forth another 
writing of positive character, and that we must 
wait to see whether he should accomplish his pur- 
pose ? Does not this look as if he were a contem- 
porary of Origen's ? . . . What Baur has incontesta- 
bly demonstrated, that the New Platonist opponent 
of Origen was contemporaneous with him, is not 
simply ignored by this Teschendorf, the appealer 
to the ignorant multitude ; it is absolutely unknown 
to 11™." But the argument brought forward bv 
Volkmar rests on nothing less than a falsification 
of the words of Origen; yet such a step could only 
be taken by a scholar of his rare attainments, who 
had neglected to read what Origen says expressly 
with regard to Celsus, that "he had long been 
dead." In both cases, therefore, in that of Celsus 
as well as in that of Herakleon, there must be a 
choice in the means of cure ; at any rate, to those 
which have been applied there must also be joined 
the excision of the passage in Irenseus and Origen, 
And is it not possible that the same Old Catholic 
critic (found out by Kitschl) who had partly in- 
vented and partly interpolated Ignatius's letters 
and those bearing his name, and who at the same 
time tricked out the Epistle of Polycarp with pas- 
sages from Ignatius, and Ignatius's Epistles, may 
have had his hand in this matter as well ? 

That which personally touches me in these out- 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE, 19 

* 

pourings of theological bitterness is of very little 
consequence compared with two other elements of 
the document under consideration, — the frivolous 
tone of its scientific pretensions and the treachery 
to the church which it displays. For my own 
part, I can only hold it as an honor to thoroughly 
displease such men ; and that my work has not en- 
tirely failed in reaching its mark, is proved to me 
in no more effective way than by the calumnious 
assaults which are made upon it; and so far as they 
have tried to blacken over what I have done, I 
freely pardon them, so far as roughness and want 
of understanding; are concerned : there would be a 
valid token that I had failed in what I proposed were 
I not the target for the unthankfulness of mockers. 
But for the falseness which treads church and 
knowledge alike under foot; for that hypocritical 
frivolousness, which degrades the church into a 
mere seminary for the propagation of untruth, and 
elevates pure figments of the brain to the rank of 
apostolical inheritances, I have nothing but a cry 
of pain and of horror. 

Only a few words regarding the new edition of 
my work. The first edition, published in March, 
1865, was followed in May by the second; the third 
aimed at a greater popularizing of the subject, and 
was accompanied by an historical sketch of my 
travels and researches. 5 It now seems advisable 
to add many details to that edition, and to make 
an effort to make the work more complete and 



20 AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

valuable. To do this, I have more than doubled 
the amount of matter. Of course it has been my 
wish, in doing this, not to injure the work, so far 
as its tone is suited to meet the wants of the gene- 
ral world of culture, although it is hard to produce 
a book for this class, and at the same time to adapt 
it to the wants of special sudents. I must beg the 
reader's indulgence, should I be found at times to 
have given one body of readers undue advantage 
over another. I have written nothing which I am 
not prepared fully to defend. And may the bless- 
ing of God not be wanting to my little work in 
its new form. 

TISCHENDORF. 

Leipzig, July 1, 1866, 



CONTENTS. 



The Gospels our sources for the life of Jesus : treatment of 
them by Renan, 23-31. Importance of the historical witnesses 
for the Gospels, 32-34. Evidence from the last decades of the 
second century : Irengeus, Tertullian, Clemens of Alexandria, 
the canon of Muratori, the oldest Latin and Syriac translation, 
34-37. Shortly before Irenoeus : Theophilus and Tatian, Clau- 
dius Apollinaris, Dionysius of Corinth, Athenagoras, 38-51. 
First and fourth quarters of the second century : Clemens of 
Rome, Ignatius, and Polycarp, 52-61. Justin and the Epistle to 
Diognetus, 61-77. The Gospel of the Hebrews, 78. The litera- 
ture of heresy before and in the middle of the second century : 
Ptolemy, Herakleon, Basilides, the Xaasenians (Ophites), and 
Perates, 79-102. Marcion, 102-11.3. Montanism and the Alo- 
gians, 116-123. Celsus vs. Christianity, 124-130. The New 
Testament apocryphal literature : the Prot evangel ; the Acts of 
Pilate ; the Gospel of Infancy, 130-152. The psendo-Clemen- 
tines, .153. Barnabas, 154-166. When and how to come to a 
decision regarding the four Gospels, 106-171. The testimony 

of Papias ; that in the Vatican prologue to John ; that of the 

21 



22 CONTENTS. 

presbyters, in support of John, 171-200. New Testament textual 
criticism, 201-209. Its evidence as to a lost form of Matthew 
and Mark, 209-211 . The text of the second century presupposes 
a full history of the canon, and gives evidence of its existence 
at about the close of the first century, 211-213. Evidence omit- 
ted : second Peter, the closing verses of John's Gospel, the Tes- 
taments of the twelve patriarchs, 213-215. Misunderstandings 
and hypotheses regarding the Gospel of John, 215, 216. Con- 
cluding remarks, 216-219. 



ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



00^400- 



(y^f HE life of Jesus has become the center 



of the religious controversies which agi- 
tate our age. The importance of this 
fact is great. At its foundation lies the 
confession that Christianity is not grounded so 
much on the doctrines of Him from whom it 
receives its name' as upon his person. Every 
acceptation of the word Christianity which is 
antagonistic to this confession, disowns the real 
character of the term, and rests on a misconcep- 
tion. The person of Jesus is the corner-stone 
on which the church bases its foundations ; to 
it the doctrine of Jesus and of his disciples 
always and with the utmost distinctness points ; 
with the person of Jesus Christianity stands or 
falls. To rob this person of his greatness, — 

23 



24 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

of that greatness which the entire church as- 
cribes to him under the name Son of God, — 
and yet to think to retain the Christian faith 
and the Christian church, is a futile attempt, a 
vain mockery. Even the morality which some 
might hope to rescue from the general ship- 
wreck of faith is weakened by the unavoidable 
and remorseless contradictions which arise ; 
for if the morality is sound, it must be a good 
tree growing from a diseased root. The life of 
Jesus is the most momentous of all questions 
which the church has to encounter, — the one 
which is decisive whether it shall or shall not 
live. 

Whence do we derive our knowledge of the 
life of Jesus ? Almost exclusively from our 
four Gospels, in which the divine person of Je- 
sus, the center of the Christian belief, and the 
main object too of all attacks upon it, is pre- 
sented in essentially the same light as in the 
Epistles of Paul, unquestionably the oldest of 
all the apostolical documents. All else that 
we know of him is confined to a few expres- 
sions and acts, and, with unimportant excep- 



TESTIMONY OF TACITUS AND PLINY. 25 

tions, is in direct connection with, and depend- 
ence on, the Gospels. By far the most of 
these sources are to be found in apocryphal, 
i.e. not genuine, untrustworthy fragments, not 
bearing the true names of their authors, and 
aiming with more or less skill to supplement 
and complete the gospel narrative ; others, 
partly of Jewish and partly of heathen origin, 
avow at the very outset the intention of assail- 
ing the Gospels. Finally, we possess in two 
classic writers of the first and the two follow- 
ing centuries, Tacitus and Pliny, a few inci- 
dental expressions which have a lasting inter- 
est: the first 6 testifying that Christ, the founder 
of the religion which had gained so strong a 
hold even in Nero's time, had been punished 
with death by the procurator Pontius Pilate 
during: the rei^n of Tiberius : while Pliny as- 
serts'ina communication to Trajan that the 
Christians, already a numerous body in Bithy- 
nia, were in the habit of singing songs of 
praise to Christ as to a God. s Our Gospels 
therefore, if not the only authorities relative 
to the life of Jesus, are by all odds the most 



26 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

important ones, and the only direct sources 
that are in existence. If then the life of Je- 
sus is only made known to us by the Gospels, 
if we are directed to these books for the solu- 
tion of all our questions about the birth, the 
activities, the conversation, character, and for- 
tunes of Jesus, w r e have of course no less 
weighty an inquiry before us than this, Whence 
spring our Gospels ? For upon the origin of 
these books hinge their trustworthiness and 
all their value. 

So much depending upon this first step, very 
many are the investigations which have been 
made in these modern times into the origin of 
the Gospels. It has been a question with what 
justice the names of those prominent members 
of the twelve, Matthew and John, and the 
names of the helpers and followers, Mark and 
Luke, have been assigned to the four Gospels, 
Just so far as the authorship of these docu- 
ments has been admitted as due to those re- 
vered men, the Gospels have been accepted as 
authentic and trustworthy records of the life 
of the Lord. Their names have been regarded 



KENAN'S LIFE OF JESUS. " 27 

as a satisfactory guaranty that, in the writings 
with which they were coupled, truth only could 
be sought, that in them truth only was wished, % 
and that in them truth was authentically re- 
corded.. There is indeed another way of test- 
ing the reliability of the Gospels. After the 
rise of the rationalizing or rationalistic spirit, 
and when the attempt was made to set the 
reason of man above everything which had 
previously borne the name of Divine Revela- 
tion, hands were laid at once on the biblical 
miracles, and it was claimed that they must be 
explained by the light of the imperfect culture 
of that time, and the incorrect appreciation of 
the Old Testament. Out of this grew the the- 
ory of accommodation, as it was called, which 
asserted that Jesus made his words chime in 
with the expectations of his age, and that he 
gave himself out to be a inore important per- 
sonage than he really was. This theory of the 
rise of the Gospels has culminated in the piece 
of botchwork which issued from the Paris press 
in 1863. The author of that book, not troub- 
ling himself with any speculations respecting 



28 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the share which the apostles may have had in 
delineating the gospel portraits, but following 
his own self-imposed theories about miracles 
and revelation, has displayed boundless reck- 
lessness and given way to the most unbridled 
phantasies respecting the gospel history, cari- 
caturing both it and its hero. He has written 
a book which has much more the character of 
a shameless calumny of Jesus than of an hon- 
est investigation into his career. Can we ap- 
ply the term historical inquiry to an attempt 
to show 9 that John wrote the fourth Gospel 
out of a spirit of self-love, not without jeal- 
ousy of Peter, 10 and full of hatred to Judas 
Iscariot ? n Can we dignify by so high a term 
as scientific investigation such a theory as his 
respecting the cause of the sympathy felt for 
Jesus by the wife of Pilate, that she saw the 
" gentle Galilean," . the "fine-looking young 
man," from a window of the palace that looked 
out on the temple-court, and that in conse- 
quence the thought that his blood was to be 
spilled rested like a mountain load upon her 
soul ? 12 To cite one or two more examples of his 



EEXAX'S LIFE OF j£SUS, "29 

mode of dealing with the Gospels, what shall 
we say of his manner of treating: the raisins; of 
Lazarus, where he endeavors to show that Je- 
sus, whose role was becoming more and more 
difficult every day, practiced an involuntary 
piece of deception upon the people and the cred- 
ulous sisters of Lazarus ? His theory is that 
the latter, while still sick, caused himself to be 
laid out for burial, and deposited in the fam- 
ily vault ; that Jesus, wishing to see his friend 
once more, caused the tomb to be opened, and 
on seeing Lazarus come forth was himself led 
to believe that the dead man had come to life 
again, — the power of resuscitating him, mean- 
while, being ascribed by the witnesses to the 
wonderful gifts of Jesus. 13 Or what shall we say 
of a theory of the conflict in Gethsemane, 14 
which seeks to throw light on the Saviour's grief 
by such words as these : " Perhaps his thoughts 
were running back to the clear springs of Gali- 
lee where he had often found refreshment, to the 
vine-stock and the fig-tree beneath whose shade 
he had rested, to the young maidens who it may 
be had responded to his love. Did he curse 



30 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

his hard fate, which denied him all the old joys 
of his life ? Did he lament his high call, and 
weep, a sacrifice on the altar of his own great- 
ness, that he had not continued to be a simple 
Nazarene artisan ? " 15 What shall we think of 
the supposition that the dreary landscape of 
Judaea — with Jerusalem, the sacred center 
of the Jewish faith and worship — drove the 
thoughts of the Galilean to the luxuriance of 
his own country's hills, and added to his grief? 16 
What shall we say of his exclamation, that 
if a better understanding of Christianity is to 
prevail among men, and the apocryphal shrines 
which now claim veneration are to be super- 
seded by authentic ones, the temple, the great 
church for all Christians, is to be built upon 
the hill of Nazareth, — the soil beneath which 
are sleeping the carpenter Joseph and thou- 
sands of Nazarenes ? n What shall we say to the 
crudest of all Renan's vagaries, the investing 
with the crown of immortality and the glitter- 
ing halo of a saint the head of that Jew dying 
on the cross, at the outset a mere kindly poeti- 
cal enthusiast, and at last an idolizing fanatic, 



GERMAN SUPPORTERS OF REXAX. 31 

involved irretrievably with the dominant party, 
and rushing willingly into the arms of death ? 18 

Surely it requires no further citations to jus- 
tify the expression of a condemnation of Re- 
nan's book : these few instances are sufficient 
to put the reader in possession of materials ade- 
quate to enable him to judge of the character 
of the work. That, in spite of its frivolous pre- 
tenses to science, in spite of its fantastic carica- 
tures of history, it has found such favor and 
■endorsement in Germany, only shows how 
widely are diffused, even in Germany, the lack 
of sound criticism, and of acquaintance with 
biblical history, as well as the depraved taste of 
an age which is sunk in unbelief. 

In this matter, German science and schol- 
arship have subjected themselves to a severe 
reproach. Not only is the prevalent rational- 
ism, which places our common human reason 
above a divine revelation, and so sets aside the 
supernatural' claims of the Gospels, a product 
of this French book, but German zeal is aroused, 
as well, to supply what is lacking of scientific 
accuracy in Kenan's work, and to make his 



32 ORTGIX OF THE FOUR GOSPELS: 

results more trustworthy. And so we have 
one of the frightful spectacles of our time, — 
French levity and German learning reaching 
brotherly hands to each other over the fresh 
grave of the Saviour. Unbelief, it would seem, 
gives even more strength than belief. 

In those quarters where regard is paid to 
historical authority, one of the points brought 
into the foreground in the attacks upon the 
authenticity of the Gospels, is the lack of early 
evidence that they were in existence at the 
opening of the Christian era. Nor can any one 
deny that this objection, if it can be maintained, 
is entitled to much weight. If it is as late as the 
year 150, or still later, that we receive the first 
tidings about John's Gospel, who would not 
find it hard to believe that it was written by 
the beloved disciple of the Lord a half century 
before ? If there is not in our possession evi- 
dence in support of the other Gospels dating 
from that time, or from the years just preceding 
it, who can deny that it does not raise doubts 
respecting their authenticity ? It is true, we 
must take into account the paucity of the liter- 



IMPORTAXCE OF OVERTHROWING THEM. 33 

• 

ature which comes clown to us from the earlier 
epoch of the church ; and besides, many a good 
book might have been written without verbally 

incorporating or directly using our Gospels : 
especially at a time when those who had been 
eye-witnesses had not been long dead ; when 
the life of the churches was directly sustained 
by the spirit of the Gospels : and when the writ- 
ten letter had not begun to be dominant over 
the living evangel. If these considerations 
diminish the importance which might be at- 
tached to the absence of biblical quotations in 
the primitive Christian literature, yet it is 
clear, on the other hand, that if such quota- 
tions are really to be found there, the manifest 
acquaintance which they might show that men 
had with the Gospels in the first half of the sec- 
ond century must be of the greatest weight in 
establishing their age, their apostolical origin, 
and their genuineness. And therefore it is a 
sacred duty that those who would subject the 
authenticity of our Gospels to a thorough scru- 
tiny, should make one of their chief duties a 
most careful investigation into the most ancient 



34 ORIGIN OF TIJE FOUR GOSPELS. 

sources of testimony respecting the existence 
and the recognized credibility of the records of 
Jesus' life. 

It seems to me that this duty has been by no 
means faithfully enough met for the first three 
so-called synoptical Gospels, and still less for 
that of John, whose want of authenticity has 
been inscribed in flaming letters upon the ban- 
ners 'of the negative school. The writer of 
these lines imposes upon himself the task of 
trying to throw some light upon the authority 
of the evangelical documents, although in pre- 
paring the work not for special students, but 
•cultivated Christians generally, it may not be 
possible to enter so exhaustively into the subject 
as under other circumstances might be desir- 
able. 

We can make as our starting-point the un- 
questioned fact that in the last decades of the 
second century our four Gospels were known 
and acknowledged in all portions of the church. 
Irenseus, from 177 on, Bishop of Lyons, where 
the first Christian church of Gaul was estab- 
lished, wrote a great work in the last decades 



EARLY QUOTATIONS. 35 

of the second century, directed at the earliest 
heresies, the Gnostic, and on every page made 
use of the Gospels, providing himself from them 
with materials to overthrow a__system which 
was threatening to destroy the doctrines of the 
church. The number of passages where he 
has recourse to the Gospels is about four hun- 
dred, and about eighty of these contain quota- 
tions from John. From the closing decade of 
the second century on, the able and learned 
Tertullian lived and labored at Carthage, in 
Africa, and in his numerous writings there 
exist hundreds of citations from the text of the 
Gospels, which he made use of as his most deci- 
sive authorities. The same is true of Clemens, 
the celebrated teacher in the school of catechu- 
mens at Alexandria, about the end of the sec- 
ond century. Nor must I fail to allude to a 
catalogue, generally known by the name of its 
discoverer, the Italian scholar, Muratori, of all 
the books which were regarded as canonical in 
the very earliest times. This work was prob- 
ably prepared at Rome, and shortly after the 
time of the Roman bishop Pius, i. e. some- 



36 OBI GIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

where between 160 and 170. In this catalogue 
of the books thus reckoned as comprising the 
New Testament, the four Gospels are at the 
head. 19 It is true, the .first few lines which re : 
late to Matthew and Mark have been lost ; but, 
at the close of the still extant words respecting 
the latter, the Gospel of Luke is spoken of as the 
third, and that of John as the fourth ; enabling 
us to see that even in the very earliest days the 
order was followed with which we are so famil- 
iar. 

I have thus summoned witnesses from Gaul, 
from proconsular Africa (the present Algiers), 
from Alexandria, and from Rome. Two others 
can be cited fitly here, although one of them 
goes back to a remoter date : I mean the two 
oldest translations from the Greek text used by 
the apostles themselves. One of these is the 
Syriac version, and bears the name Peshito ; 
the other is the Latin version, known under the 
title Itala : both of them give the four Gospels 
the first place. The canonical acceptance of all 
four must unquestionably have been general, as 
we see that they were transferred openly, and 



as a whole, into the language of the newly-con- 
verted Christians, the Latins and Syrians. 
The Syriac translation, which takes us to the 
neighborhood of the Euphrates, is almost uni- 
versally assigned to the end of the second cen 
tury ; and, although positive proofs are wanting 
in support of this date, yet we are not without 
good grounds for accepting it. The Latin ver- 
sion, on the contrary, had begun to gain gen- 
eral recognition even before the end of the sec- 
ond century; for both Tertuliian, in his quota- 
tions from Irenaeus, and the Latin translator of 
Irenasus's great work against heresy, writing 
about the end of the second century, make use 
of the text of the Itala. This, of course, im- 
plies that the Latin translation was made some 
years before the close of the second century. I 
shall have occasion subsequently to allude again 
to the striking fact that it was necessary to 
translate the Gospels into Latin and Syriac as 
early as the second half of the second century, 
and that the number of documents was limited 
to the four with which we are now familiar* 
• Looking a little more closely into the testi- 



38 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

mony of the two great Fathers, Irenseus^ and 
Tertullian, we have to ask, Can their evidence 
be so limited in its application as to only prove 
that the four Gospels were fully accepted in their 
day? Irenseus not merely invests these docu- 
ments with entire authority in the citations 
which he makes to overthrow the Gnostic here- 
tics ; it even appears in his work that the Gos- 
pels, or rather, to use his own expression, the 
fourfoldness of the Gospel, has been conformed 
to the analogy of the four quarters of the globe, 
the four chief winds, the four faces of the cher- 
ubim. He asserts that the four Gospels are the 
four pillars on which the church rests as it cov- 
ers the whole earth, and in this number four 
he recognizes a special token of the Creator's 
wisdom. 20 Is such a representation compatible 
with the fact that at the time of Irenasus the 
four Gospels first began to be accepted ? or 
that an attempt was then being made to append 
a fourth and newer one to the three older ones 
then current? Is it not much more credible 
that the acceptance of all the four was then of 
so long standing and so thoroughly complete, 



IREN^US'S TESTIMONY. 39 

that the Bishop of Lyons could allude to the 
fourfoldness of the Gospel as a thing universally 
recognized, and in consequence of this very re- 
cognition speak of it as a thing which harmo- 
nizes with great and unchanging cosmical rela- 
tions ? Irenaeus died in the second year after 
the close of the second century, but in his youth 
he had sat at the feet of the venerable Poly- 
carp, who had been a disciple of John the evan- 
gelist, and had been acquainted with many eye- 
witnesses of Jesus' life. In mentioning this 
fact Irenseus 21 alludes very tenderly to the state- 
ment of his revered teacher Polycarp. that all 
that he had heard from the lips of John and 
other disciples of Jesus coincided fully with the 
written account. Yet let us hear his own words 
as given in a letter to Florinus : ** I saw you 
while I was yet a youth in Lower Asia with 
Polycarp, when you were living in scenes of 
princely splendor, and when you were striving 
to gain the approval of Polycarp. What took 
place then is fresher in my memory than what 
has occurred more recently. What we took in 
in our youth grows up as it were with us, and 



40 III GIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

is incorporated in us. And so I can even now 

4 

bring back to mind just the place where the 
good Polycarp used to sit when lie talked to us, 
how he looked as he came in and as he went 
out, how he lived, how he used to speak to the 
people, how he used to allude to his intercourse 
with John and repeat the words of others who 
had seen the Lord, how he used to recount 
what he had heard from their own lips about 
the miracles and the teachings of the Lord, — 
and all in full accordance with the written nar- 
rative." 22 

Thus writes Irenaeus respecting his inter- 
course with Polycarp and respecting the com- 
munications of Polycarp. The date of the young 
Irenaeus's intercourse with the aged saint must 
be set approximately at about the year 150. Ire- 
naeus died in 202, according to old accounts a 
martyr, while Polycarp perished at the stake in 
1G5, " after having," to use his own expression, 
" served the Lord eighty-six years." And is it 
to be believed that Irenaeus never heard from 
his teacher, whose communications respecting 
John he expressly refers to, one word regarding 



POLYCARP'S TESTIMOFT. 41 

the Gospel of John ? Indisputably one part 
of Polycarp's testimony relative to John's Gos- 
pel carries us back to John himself. For Poly- 
carp's evidence respecting the work of his 
teacher must be based upon the testimony of 
his teacher himself. The case becomes all the 
more clear the more closely we look into it on 
the adversaries' side, and range ourselves with 
those who deny the validity of John's Gospel. 
According to this view, Polycarp, although say- 
ing so much to IreniBus regarding tTohn, did 
not drop a word regarding the Gospel of John. 
But supposing he did not, is it credible that 
Irenasus fully accepted that Gospel, that work 
which seemed to be the noblest gift of John to 
Christianity, the report of an eye-witness re- 
specting the life, death, and resurrection of the 
Saviour of the world, as a Gospel which ran di- 
rectly counter to the testimony of the three 
other evangelists ? Would not the very cir- 
cumstance that Polycarp made no mention of 
it have convinced Irenasus of its want of au- 
thenticity ? And yet it is asserted that in order 
to meet and overthrow false teachers, and the 



42 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

men who falsified the canon, he did not hesitate 
to reckon the Gospel of John as strictly em- 
braced among the sacred books. 

This on which I am now laying stress is 
nothing new ; it has long stood recorded on the 
pages of Irenseus, and has long been read there. 
But it has not had its due weight ; else how 
could it have been so lightly passed over ? For 
my own part I must completely justify the as- 
signing of much greater weight, on the part of 
correct aifd thorough investigators, to the testi- 
mony of Poiycarp and Trenaaus respecting the 
Gospel of John, than to all the difficulties and 
all the objections urged by skeptical scholars. 

And is the case not similar with Tertullian 
and his testimony respecting the Gospel ? This 
man, who had been transformed from a worldly 
heathen lawyer into a powerful advocate of 
divine truth, enters so critically into the ques- 
tion of the origin and relative value of the 
four Gospels as expressly to subordinate Mark 
and Luke to Matthew and John, on the ground 
that the former were mere helpers and compan- 
ions of the apostles, while the latter were se- 



TERTULLIAN'S TESTIMONY. 43 

lected by the Lord himself and invested with 
fall authority. 23 The same author propounds 
also an inexpugnable canon of historical criti- 
cism, a test of the truth of the early Christian 
documents, and especially those of apostolic 
origin, in that he makes the value of testimony 
dependent on the epoch of the witness, and de- 
mands that what was held as true in his clay 
should be judged in the light of its prior ac- 
ceptance. If it had been accepted before, it was 
fair to suppose that it had been equally accepted 
in the time of the apostles ; its authenticity 
must therefore have been admitted by the apos- 
tolical church, founded as it was by the apostles 
themselves. 24 And is it to be believed that this 
acute man was capable of being deceived in his 
acceptance of the Gospels and in his defense of 
them by any thin web of sophistry or touch of 
charlatanism ? The passages just referred to 
are taken from his celebrated reply to Marcion, 
who in a wanton and heretical spirit had im- 
pugned the authenticity of the Gospels. Three 
of the four he had wholly excluded, and of the 
fourth he retained only just so much as it pleased 



44 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

him to do. In replying to him, Tertullian ex- 
pressly bases his argument on the ground that at 
the time when the apostolical church was found- 
ed all the four Gospels were accredited. Has 
such a statement no weight in the mouth of a 
man like Tertullian ? When he wrote, scarcely 
a hundred years had elapsed since the death of 
John. At that date the testimony, appealed 
to by him, of the church at Ephesus, in which 
John had labored so long and amid which he 
had died, must have been full and decisive re- 
specting the genuineness or spuriousness of 
John's Gospel. Nor was it a matter of any 
difficulty to ascertain what wa's the judgment 
which this church passed on the Gospel. And 
we must not overlook the fact that we have not 
to do, in this matter, with*a scholar who is con- 
tenting himself with merely learned investiga- 
tions, but with a man full of earnestness re- 
specting his faith, and taking very seriously the 
question of human salvation. The Christian 
documents which asserted a connection between 
themselves and the origin of the new faith, the 
documents at which all the worldly wisdom of 



IRESuEUS AND TERTULLIAX. 45 

the time in which Tertullian himself was reared 
took offense, — were they likely to be accepted 
by him without inquiry, and in a blind cre- 
dulity ? And inasmuch as he expressly assures 
us that he bases his acceptation of all the four 
Gospels on the credit of the apostolical church. 25 
is it not an unworthy suspicion, the doubting 
that he made thorough inquiry into the capacity 
of the apostolical church to pass an authentic 
judgment on the Christian documents ? 

I insist therefore, to sum up the matter, that 
the testimony of Irenseus and Tertullian re- 
specting the four Gospels is not to be taken as 
an isolated, unrelated fact, but that it must be 
considered as a valid result of all the historical 
evidence which was at their command. And 
how far we are justified in this, is shown not 
only by the authorities already adduced, the 
author of the Muratori list of Xew Testament 
books, the African translator of the Gospels 
into Latin, the originator of the Itala, but by 
all the other witnesses who lived prior to the 
time of Irenseus and Tertullian. 

Many of my readers are acquainted with the 



46 " ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

so-called Harmonies of the Gospels, — the works 
in which the four sacred narratives are co-ordi- 
nated into a single one. In this way an effort 
has been made to draw from the Gospels alone 
a closely followed and faithful portrait of our 
Lord's life, those points which one narrator has 
brought more prominently into view than the 
others being employed as supplementary to the 
other accounts, and a complete picture being 
the result. In these works the narrative of 
John has been drawn upon to supply the inci- 
dents occurring in the last three years of Jesus 5 
life, and to follow his course step by step. 
Harmonies of this kind were prepared as early 
as the year 170 by two men whose names are 
known to us : one of them was Theophilus, 
Bishop of Antioch in Syria ; the other was 
Tatian, a disciple of Justin the great theologi- 
an and martyr. 26 True, both of those works 
are lost ; but Jerome speaks in the fourth cen- 
tury of the one prepared by Theophilus as still 
existing, describing it as a combination of the 
four Gospels in one continuous narrative ; 2T re- 
specting the second we have the testimony of 



EARLY HARMONIES. 47 

Eusebius 28 and* Theodoret, 29 the latter of whom 
speaks with intimate knowledge. Tatian him- 
self alludes to his work as 4i the Gospel made 
up of four, the Diatessaron." Both of these 
men wrote other works which are still extant. 
In 180 and 181 Theophilus indited the three 
books to Autolycus, a learned heathen who had 
assailed Christianity. In this work are ex- 
tracts from Matthew, Luke, and John. It is 
especially noteworthy that he cites the latter 
(ii. 22), alluding explicitly to the name of the 
author. His words are, " This is taught by the 
Holy Scriptures and all inspired men, among 
whom is John, who says, ' In thcj beginning was 
the Word, and the Word was with God,' and 
then follows, ' and the Word was God : ail 
things were made by him, and without him 
was not anything made that was made.' " 
This makes it certain that the Harmony of The- 
ophilus embraced the Gospel of John. 30 The 
same is true of Tatian : for in his Addresses to 
the Heathen, a work filled with learning, and 
very decided in its tone, written probably be- 
tween 166 and 170, there are several passages 



48 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

quoted from John's Gospel, such as this : " The 
Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness 

comprehendeth it not The Life was the 

Light of men All things were made by 

him, and without him was not anything made 
that was made." From this it would seem cer- 
tain that his Harmony, like that of Theophilus, 
although it may have taken some liberties with 
the order of the narrative, included the Gospel 
of John : and this chimes admirably with the 
statement of Bishop Bar Salibi, that the Diates- 
saron of Tatian, accompanied by a commentary 
by Ephraim, and thus discriminated from the 
Diatessaron q£ Ammonius, began with the 
words, " In the beginning was the Word." 

These Harmonies last mentioned, one of which 
must with much probability be ascribed to a 
date within the first sixty years of the second 
century, have far more worth than what would 
be gathered from single scattered extracts, for 
their preparation points back conclusively to a 
time when the four Gospels were already ac- 
cepted as a perfect record, and when the neces- 
sity had begun to be felt of deducing a higher 



CLAUDIUS APOLLIXARIS. 49 

unity and a more harmonious completeness 
from them than the diversity of the various 
books .and the apparent discrepancies had ren- 
dered apparent. If these efforts are to be as- 
signed -to a date as early as the second decade 
subsequently to the middle of the second cen- 
tury, it makes the inference a necessary one 
that the use and recognition of the four Gospels 
must be assigned to a much earlier date. 

Similar testimony we owe to a cotemporary of 
the two men just named, Claudius Apollinaris, 
Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia, whose epoch 
is assigned by Eusebius (iv. 26) to the reign of 
Marcus Aurelius. For in a fragment preserved 
in the Chronicon Paschale he declares that if 
the Quartodecimanians (so called from holding 
like the Jews that the fourteenth of Xisan was 
the day for celebrating the paschal sacrifice) 
appeal justly to Matthew in support of the view 
that Jesus partook of the last supper with his 
disciples at the precise time of celebrating the 
paschal offering, there must be an antagonism 
among the writers of the several Gospels. Now 
as in this contest Matthew, Mark, and Luke 

4 



50 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

must be ranged on the one side, and John on 
the other, the words of Apollinaris indicate 
that all the Gospels were conceded in his day 
to have equal value. To this may be added 
that iii one passage still extant in the same 
Chronicon there is undeniable reference to 
John's allusion (xix. 34) to the piercing of 
Jesus' side. 

According to Eusebius, the choice of Diony- 
sius as Bishop of Corinth occurred in the year 
170. The same historian has preserved for us 
(Euseb. iv. 23) some fragments of letters and 
other documents from the pen of Dionysius. 
To one church he sent in the epistolary form 
expositions of Scripture ; and to the Romans 
he wrote, after animadverting severely upon 
the efforts to discredit the genuineness of his 
own letters, that.it was not at all strange that 
men sought to discredit the Gospels, since these 
too were documents whose value was so great 
that their authenticity should be indisputable. 
The expression, Holy Scriptures, might not ne- 
cessarily refer to the New Testament ; but the 
word which Dionysius employs — writings re- 



ATHEXAGORAS 'S^APOL OG Y. 51 

specting the Lord, — the same term which Clem- 
ens of Alexandria uses (Strom, vii. 1) — has 
the same signification with the expression New 
Testament, and relates evidently to the books 
which were then accepted as constituting the 
New Testament canon. 

The Apology written by Athenagoras of Ath- 
ens, in the year 177, contains several quota- 
tions from Matthew and Luke ; it displays also 
unmistakable marks of being influenced by 
John's Gospel; as, for example, in the passages 
which speak of the Logos as the Word of God, 
and which allude to the Son of God who is in 
the Father as the Father is in the Son. It con- 
tains the very expression found in the first 
chapter of John, third verse, " All things were 
made by him,' 3 and in the seventeenth chapter, 
twenty-first verse, " as thou, Father, art in me 
and I in thee." 

I have taken these witnesses to the credibil- 
ity of our Gospels from the epoch prior to Ire- 
nasus and Tertullian, and just at the threshold 
of the Irenaean period, the second and third 
decade after the middb of the second century 



0'2 ORWIX OF THE FOUR GOSPEZS. 

There are, however, left to us other witnesses 
much earlier, and, like those just quoted, men 
who speak to us right from the very bosom of 
the church. 31 

Between the apostolic epoch and that which 
followed there intervene the so-called apostolic 
Fathers ; for as direct disciples of the apostles 
they must be reckoned as in immediate connec- 
tion with the apostolic age. If in the little which 
these men have left us we do not find anything 
which can be construed as definite testimony as 
to the authenticity of the Gospels, still we are 
not to conclude from their silence that the Gos- 
pels were not in existence before their time. But 
should there be in their writings a constant 
use of the Old Testament, and not the slightest 
use of the New, in spite of the fact that the 
latter lay so much nearer to hand, 32 the proba- 
bility must be accepted as great that at that 
time the Gospels were not accepted as of equal 
weight with the Old Testament. 

And this appears to have been the case with 
the epistle of the Roman Clement, written in 
the second or third decade before the close of 



EPISTLES OF IGNATIUS AND POLYCARP. 53 

the first century, and about a decade after the 
destruction of Jerusalem. At that time no 
canon of the Gospels was in existence. It is 
indeed unquestionable that in his epistle, rich 
in quotations from the Old Testament, Clement 
refers here and there to passages 33 in the Pau- 
line Epistles, which have indeed chronologically 
priority over the Gospels, though not in any 
other sense. 34 

It. is otherwise with those other constituents 
of this literature to whose discussion we now 
come, — the epistles of Ignatius and that of 
Polycarp. The first of these have reached us 
various in extent and variously edited. Three 
extant only in Latin are manifestly later addi- 
tions to the older literature ; and so too are five 
others, written in Greek, Latin, and Armenian, 
their authenticity being disowned by the fact 
that Eusebius makes no allusion to them. 
There are besides seven epistles, which are ex- 
tant in a longer and a shorter form : of the 
longer one, there is also an ancient Latin ver- 
sion ; of the shorter, a Latin version and Syriac, 
and Armenian ones as well. With this is to 



54 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

be joined the fact that twenty years ago a Syr- 
iac version of three of these seven epistles was 
discovered, more brief than the short Greek 
text. After the debate respecting the longer 
and the shorter epistles had been decisively set- 
tled in favor of the shorter, the question arose 
whether the three extant in the Syriac transla- 
tion are not to be preferred to these seven 
shorter ones. When several scholars declared 
themselves in favor of this, others defended the 
earlier origin of the seven Greek epistles, in- 
sisting that the three in Syriac were a mere 
extract, intended for devotional uses. We hold 
this to be the more correct view. Similar 
occurrences are not unknown in the apocryphal 
writings of the New Testament. An extraordi- 
nary proof in this case is afforded by the cir- 
cumstance that these seven epistles are not 
only recognized by Eusebius (iii. 36), but are 
alluded to in the letter of Polycarp. In order 
to escape the force of this testimony, the most 
decisive passage in the latter epistle, defended 
as it is by Eusebius himself, must be set aside 
as unauthentic. Besides this, the assigning of 



EPISTLES OE IGNATIUS AND POLTCARP. bb 

superior value to the three Syriac letters is 
invalidated by the fragmentary character of 
many passages: one is so manifestly an excerpt 
from the Greek text that it must be admitted 
that one section has been lost through the care- 
lessness of the copyist. We claim the right, 
therefore, of holding to the authenticity of the 
seven epistles ascribed by Eusebius and Poly- 
carp to Ignatius, and written while he was on 
the way from Antiocli. through Smyrna and 
Troas, to his martyrdom at Rome. Examining 
them with reference to our present theme, we 
find several allusions to Matthew and John. 
Take this passage (letter to the Romans, chap. 
6) : ; * For what is a man profited if he shall gain 
the whole world and lose his own soul?" taken 
literally from Matt. xvi. In like manner, the 
passage in his epistle to the people of Smyrna. 
in which he asserts of Jesus that he was baptized 
by John " in order that all righteousness might 
be fulfilled by him," reminds one of Matt. iii. 15 : 
••for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteous- 
ness." In the letter to the Romans (chap. 7), 
he writes, 4i I want the bread of God, the bread 



56 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

of heaven,. the bread of life, which is the body 
of Jesus Christ the Son of God; . • . . and 
I want the draught of God, the blood of Jesus, 
which is imperishable love -and eternal life." 
Compare this with the sixth chapter of John, 
verse 41 : "I am the bread which came down 
from heaven ; " verse 48 : " I am that bread of 
life;" verse 51: " And the bread that I will 
give is my flesh ; " verse 54 : " Whoso eateth 
my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal 
life." To the Philadelphians he writes (chap. 
7), "What if some wished to lead me astray 
after the flesh ? but the Spirit is not enticed ; 
he is from God ; he knows wherever he cometh 
and whither he goeth, and he brings to punish- 
ment that which is hidden." These verses 
have, as their basis John iii. 6 to 8, 35 while the 
last clause grows out of the twentieth 38 verse. 
Were these allusions of Ignatius to Matthew 
and John a mere isolated phenomenon, and one 
which would be adverse to other points in this 
discussion on which no doubts rest, they would 
not have decisive weight. But so far from 
militating against other points of evidence, they 



POLY CARP ■■£ EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 57 

are in full agreement with them, particularly in 
view of the fact that at the time when the let- 
ters were written, between 107. the date .gener- 
ally assigned, and 115. they contain references 
to two of the most important of the four Gos- 
pels. 

The letter of Polycarp to the Philippians 
connects itself most closely with those of Igna- 
tius. According to his own testimony, it was 
written very soon after the martyrdom of Igna- 
tius ; that is. between 107 and 115. It contains 
very brief quotations from Matthew, as, for ex- 
ample, in chap. 2 : "Think on the Lord how he 
said. Judge not, that ye be not judged [Matt. 
vii. 1]. Forgive, and it shall be forgiven you 
[similar to Matt. vi. 14]. Be merciful, that 
you may obtain mercy [compare with Matt. v. 
7]. And with what measure ye mete it shall 
be measured to you again [a literal quotation 
from Matt. vii. 2]. And blessed are the poor, 
and they which are persecuted for righteous- 
ness' sake ; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven'"' 
[taken almost verbatim from Matt. v. 3 and 
10]. Further, chap. 7: s ' ; TTe will implore 



58 ORIGIN OF THE FOUX GOSPELS. 

the Omniscient God not to lead us into temp- 
tation, remembering the words of the Lord, 
The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak" 
[compare Matt. vi. 13 and xxvi. 41]. Special 
weight mast be ascribed to that passage in 
Polycarp's letter which clearly manifests the use 
of the First Epistle of John. Polycarp writes, 
chap. 7 : " For every one who does not confess 
that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is anti- 
christ: " in John (iv. 8) the passage runs, " Ev- 
ery spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is 
come in the flesh is not of God ; and this is that 
spirit of antichrist." The importance of this 
use by Polycarp of the Epistle of John is based 
upon this, that — although the heroes of doubt 
bring into suspicion even that whigh is really 
indisputable — the Epistle and the Gospel of 
John are shown, by their essential unity of in- 
cident and language, to have necessarily had 
the same author ; and thus the ilse of the Epis- 
tle argues the use of the Gospel as well. I 
have shown above, from Polycarp's intimate 
relation to John, how valuable is his testimony: 
it has such great weight as scarcely to allow a 



POLYCARP' S LETTER TO THE PHILIPPIAXS. 59 

word to be uttered in disavowal of the writings 
which he confirms. The unworthy skill of 
modern scholars has not shrunk, however, from 
setting aside the fact of Polycatp's testimony 
and unnerving its strength. A writer of much 
acuteness says, " T^e are not compelled to re- 
gard the words of Polycarp as an actual quota- 
tion from John, for that may have been a sen- 
tence which had come into circulation in the 
church, and may have been committed to paper 
by John just as well as by Polycarp, without 
compelling the latter to learn it from the for- 
mer." Before this conjecture had been bruit- 
ed, a fellow-believer had fallen upon another 
way out of the difficulty: " Can the thing not 
be reversed ? May not the author of the Johan- 
nean Gospel, which is as little genuine as so 
much else that has for two thousand years re- 
ceived the reverent homage of Christendom, — 
may not this false John have cited as well from 
Polycarp ? " It requires a great deal of courage 
to give utterance to such an idle fancy ; yet 
there are men of learning who are not lacking 
in this courage. But the universal and radical 



60 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

medicament which must be relied on at the 
last admits in this instance of a double applica- 
tion. If the Gospel of John can be thrown 
overboard so easily, the Epistle of Polycarp can 
not so readily be disposed of. Polycarp, then, 
did not write the epistle. Yet the disciple of 
Polycarp, Irenseus, believed and gave his wit- 
ness to just the contrary. But there are never 
lacking specious grounds for a false position ; 
and the professors of the nineteenth century 
have the art of putting out of sight even an 
Irenaeus and his fellows. 

The attack on the authenticity of Polycarp's 
epistle is all the more worth refuting, because, 
if successful, it does away no less with the gen- 
uineness of Ignatius' s epistles, all the more 
troublesome if they are to be accepted in the 
limits which Polycarp and Eusebius assigned to 
them. On this account the latest outbreaks of 
critical presumption and audacity have been 
directed against the whole Polycarp-Ignatius 
literature. What onQ of these critical heroes 
does not venture, another does. One goes to 
work more in " root and branch" fashion, an- 



JUSTIN MARTYR. 61 

other more artistically. The one contents him- 
self with rejecting on his own authority all 
those passages in Pplycarp's letter which allude 
to the person and epistles of Ignatius, imputing 
them to a forger known to have lived long be- 
fore Eusebius's time ; the other, on the contrary, 
casts away the whole letter. In like manner, 
the one satisfies himself with regarding the 
three shortest Syrian epistles of Ignatius as 
genuine ; the other holds it more advisable to 
assert that not a single one of the collective let- 
ters of Ignatius is genuine. Such dealings as 
this would soon convert the temple of God into 
a common ruin. 

For my own part, I do not hesitate to advance 
further in the period of Polycarp. Justin the 
Martyr, even before his violent death in Rome 
in 168 made his memory dear to the church, 
had attained to great celebrity through his 
writings. Three of his works are still extant 
in the complete form, and their authenticity is 
undisputed, — the two apologies and the dia- 
logue with the Jew Tryphon. Eusebius dis- 
plays perfect familiarity with the two which 



62 QRIGW OF TKE FOUR GOSPELS. 

were written to defend Christianity against the 
attacks of high pagan authorities, and speaks 
of them as two separate works, one of which 
was dedicated to the Emperor Antoninus, the 
other to Marcus Aurelius. Jerome repeats the 
statement of Eusebius, and most scholars 37 
down to the present day have coincided with 
him. The first work must be assigned to the 
year 138 or 139, the other to the year 181, the 
first year of the reign of Marcus Aurelius. 
Respecting the first, however, it should be said 
that it was in 139 that Marcus Aurelius (Beris- 
simus) was named as Cassar, yet the inscription 
does not address him with the imperial title. 
Very recently there have been new views taken 
respecting this matter, and there has been 
unjustified evidence 38 brought forward to sup- 
port the assigning of the year 147 m to the pro- 
duction of the first of the two works in ques- 
tion : some, moreover, have felt themselves jus- 
tified in taking a position not warranted by 
Eusebius and Jerome, and in regarding the 
second apology as no independent production, 
but a mere appendix to the first. Neither the 



JUSTIN MARTYRS TESTIMONY. 63 

one view nor the other appears to me to be 
thoroughly grounded. Still, the value of Jus- 
tin's testimony is very little affected by the ques- 
tion whether he wrote a few years prior or sub- 
sequently to the year 140. Yet the fact that 
these two works of Justin's were written prior 
to the middle of the second century makes the 
question one of great interest whether he dis- 
cussed our Gospels in them. It is a topic which 
has been treated in our time by many persons, 
and with great variance of opinion. What is 
the essential result gained from these investiga- 
tions ? That Justin often quotes from our own 
Matthew, is indisputable. 40 That in various 
passages he follows Mark and Luke, is extremely 
probable. 41 Yet this fact has been invalidated 
by the efforts of some to show that Justin did 
not use our Gospels as his basis, but writings 
very like them in character, perhaps the Gos- 
pel of the Hebrews, or, according to some, the 
Gospel of Peter, which was derived from the 
latter, but which, with the exception of a few 
passages, 42 lias remained entirely unknown to 
us to the present time. One support for this 



64 ORIGIN OF THE FQUk GOSPELS. 

view is found in the fact that some quotations 
of Justin are also found in the pseudo-Clemen- 
tine homilies, having there the same or similar 
differences from the readings in the canonical 
text. 43 The supposition is, perhaps, an admis- 
sible one, that Justin, at the very earliest times, 
drew that Gospel of the Hebrews, which con- 
tained such repeated references to Matthew, 
into the circle of his evangelical quotations in 
one of his first works ; for we have Eusebius's 
authority, in the first half of the fourth century, 
for the fact that at his time this Gospel was 
reckoned by several authorities as belonging to 
the canon. On the other hand, it is a mani- 
fest and groundless exercise of arbitrary au- 
thority to hold that such of his quotations as 
harmonize more or less closely with our received 
text are taken from a source respecting which 
we are left to conjecture alone. Such a view is 
all the more inadmissible from the fact that 
free extracts from our Gospels are fully in ac- 
cordance with the character of the times in 
which they fall ; and this is the same epoch, 
the first half of the second century, to which 



JUSTW MARTYR'S TESTIMONY. §5 

we trace the main origin of the diverse mate- 
rials which enter into the canon, and more es- 
pecially the Gospels. With equal freedom Jus- 
tin makes his quotations from the Old Testa- 
ment, even if he may not be proved to take his 
text exclusively from the standard Septuagint. 
And the fact is not to be overlooked, that the 
passages quoted by Justin from the Gospels can 
not be judged by the documents comprising the 
New Testament text which has come down to 
us, and which forms the substance of our usual 
editions ; it is clear that many of our most 
widely diffused readings have proceeded from 
earlier or more recent corruptions in the primi- 
tive text ; the Gospels especially were subject' 
to arbitrary changes within the very first ten 
years after they had been committed to writ- 
ing. 44 

My discussion thus far of the extracts which 
Justin makes from the Gospels relates solely to 
those which he draws from the synoptic ones, 
the first three. Despite the prevailing skepti- 
cism in this matter, it is as good as certain that 
Justin made use of those three Gospels : but 

5 



66 oniGiJSr of the four gospels. 

all the more obstinate is the assertion that he 
had no acquaintance with John's Gospel. But 
what in fact is his relation to John ? In my 
opinion there are most cogent reasons for be- 
lieving that John was read and used by Justin. 
The delineation of the person of Christ, char- 
acteristic of John, as, for example, in the open- 
ing of the Gospel, "In the beginning was the 
Word, and the Word was with God, and the 
Word was God," and in verse fourteen, " And 
the Word became flesh," as well as the general 
designation of Jesus as the Logos or Word of 
God, 45 appears unmistakably in not a few pas- 
sages in Justin, such, for instance, as " And Je- 
sus Christ was begotten in a manner wholly pe- 
culiar to himself as the Son of God, while he 
is also the Word (Logos) of the same." " The 
primeval force (pvvaiug) after the Father of 
All and God the Lord, is the Son, the Word 
(Logos) ; and I shall show how he through 
the incarnation (aaoxoTtoiTjdc'ig^) became man." 
" The Word (Logos) of God is the Son of the 
same." " As they have not confessed all that 
belongs to the Logos, which is Christ, they have 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. 67 

often uttered what is at variance with itself." 
" Through the Word (Logos) of God, Jesus 
Christ our Saviour became flesh (oaQ-Aonoirftzig) ." 
To these passages, taken from the brief second 
Apology, I add the following, taken from the 
first (chap. 33) : " By the expressions the 
Holy Ghost and the Power of God in Luke i. 35 
[the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the 
power of the Highest shall overshadow thee], 
we are to understand the Logos, which is the 
first begotten of God." In the "Dialogue," 
chap. 105, we find that " the same was begotten 
by the Father of All after a peculiar manner 
as the Word (Logos) and Power (Swaptg), be- 
coming flesh through the instrumentality of 
the Virgin Mary, as we learn from the memori- 
als which I have already displayed." In order 
to invalidate the proof found here that Justin 
wrote not independently of John, critics have 
made an effort to point out the differences be- 
tween the conceptions of Logos which they both 
maintained, and to show that Justin had a su- 
perficial and merely external view of it. But 
is it to be supposed that those who first accepted 



CS ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the doctrines of John were able to fathom and 
exhaust them all ? On the contrary, does not 
the fact that Justin was not able to penetrate 
to the depths of John's theology show that in 
his very allusions to it, without fully compre- 
hending it, he was "not independent of it ? It 
seems to me that the internal connection be- 
tween both meets the opponents of the authen- 
ticity of John's Gospel in no more convincing 
manner than in showing how the doctrines 
of John may be culled from the words of 
Justin. 48 

There are not wanting passages in John's 
Gospel, moreover, which may be found specifi- 
cally reproduced in Justin. In the u Dialogue," 
chap. 88, he writes of John the Baptist, "The 
people believed that he was the Christ ; but he 
said to them, I am not Christ, but the voice 
of a preacher." This is in direct connection 
with the words of John i. 20 and 23 ; for the 
first words in the reply of the Baptist have been 
reported by no other evangelist than John. 

Twice can Justin's expressions only be ex- 
plained by supposing him to have been familiar 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. GO 

with the account in John ix. of the man who 
had been born blind. He speaks expressly of 
the miraculous healings effected by Jesus, and 
says in the first Apology (chap. 22) that the 
Saviour restored to health one who was born 
lame, palsied, and blind. 47 In like manner in 
the " Dialogue " (chap. 69) he declares that 
Jesus healed those who were blind, deaf, and 
lame from their birth, 48 giving to one sound 
limbs, to another hearing, to a third restored 
sight. What a trick of art is it to take the 
words " I was born blind," 49 spoken by the man 
who was a defender of Christ, and who corre- 
sponds to the blind man of Jericho, and to 
make them refer to an unknown source used 
by Justin, an ostensibly lost authority of the 
narrative which he gives elsewhere ! To what 
end is this ? To no other than to discredit the 
Gospel of John, and to deny that it was before 
Justin when he wrote. 

The words of Zechariah xii. 10 Justin quotes 
(first Apology, 52 ; also " Dialogue," 14 and 
33) precisely in the language of John xix. 37, 
"they shall look on him whom they pierced." 



70 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

The text of the Seventy, which Jerome express- 
ly confirms, has an entirely different transla- 
tion, 50 of this passage ; yet there is one of the 
older versions given us by Aquila, Symmachus, 
and Theodotion, which coincides with the lan- 
guage of John and Justin. There is nothing 
more improbable than that John and Justin 
were here independent of each other, and fol- 
lowed a translation of the Hebrew text which 
is unknown to us. Is the acceptance of this 
theory, one of the most untenable of positions, 
taken to avoid the manifest connection between 
the words of Justin and those of John ? * 

To close this part of our discussion, we find 
in Justin's first Apology, chap. 61, Christ has 
said, " Unless ye are born again, ye can not en- 
ter the kingdom of heaven. It is manifest to 
every one that those who have been born once 
can not enter again into their mother's womb." 
This passage has been the theme of much con- 
troversy ; but I am fully of the opinion that 
Justin had in view the passage in John iii. 3 to 
5, " Verily, verily, I say rinto thee, Except a 
man be born again, 51 he can not see the king- 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. 71 

doin of God. 52 Nicodemus saith unto him, 
How can a man be born when be is old ? Can 
be enter the second time into his mother's 
womb and be born ? Jesus answered, Verily, 
verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born 
of water and of the Spirit he can not enter 
into the kingdom of God " [kingdom of heaven 
according to the Sinaitic Codex and other an- 
cient authorities.] Now what means is there 
of escaping the inference which the parallelism 
in these two passages gives rise to ? Those 
who have attempted to do this have quoted Matt, 
xviii. 8, " Verily I say unto you, Except ye be 
converted, and become as little children, ye 
shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven," 
and have given utterance to the suspicion that 
in some lost Gospel, perhaps that of the 
Hebrews, to which reference has already been 
made, this passage was recorded just as Justin 
has given it, his authority therefor being not 
John, but some previous writer. 53 In order 
therefore to avoid what lies directly in our 
path, we are compelled to have recourse to 
some unknown higher authority. The second 



72 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

part of Justin's expression gives all the less 
reason for appealing from John to Matthew, that 
the fifth verse in the passage in John (stand- 
ing in, direct connection with the third), " he 
can not enter into the kingdom of heaven" 
[Himnielreich] , is the apparent basis of 
Justin's expression, " ye can not enter into 
the kingdom of heaven." The phrase " king- 
dom of God" was completely overshadowed by 
the more usual one, kingdom of heaven. 54 De- 
cisive too of the personal use of John by 
Justin is that expression of the latter relative 
to the entering again into the mother's womb 
and being born, derived from John iii. 4. To 
suppose such a coincidence of thought and lan- 
guage to have been accidental, is a feat of 
trickery which can deceive no one capable of 
forming an independent judgment. 

To this result, which confirms the authenti- 
city of the first three Gospels as much as it does 
the fourth, I must add two points more, which 
still strengthen my conclusions. One of these 
is, that Justin is in the habit of alluding to 
the " Memorabilia of the Apostles, known as 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. 73 

Gospels," without specifically mentioning the 
names of the authors. Yet while doing this he „ 
makes particular mention of the fact that the 
writers were apostles 55 and companions of Je- 
sus, and by speaking of their combined writ- 
ings as the " Gospel " he leads us to the un- 
doubting conviction that it was invested with 
full canonical authority : and such an investi- 
ture naturally allows the names of the wri- 
ters to fall into the background and to be 
unnoticed, while their writings might have 
general acceptance. In the second place, we 
have to notice that Justin, even in his first 
Apology (chap. 67), asserts that in the Chris- 
tian congregations the ;i Memorabilia of the 
Apostles or the writings of the Prophets" were 
read every Sunday. Here then is an instance 
of the Gospels and the prophetical books being 
placed on the same plane, the first being ex- 
alted to the same canonicity which the latter 
had enjoyed from the first. It is an error or a 
self-deception to deny that Justin's words do 
not warrant the acceptance of those books as 
canonical, on the ground that there were writ- 



74 O RIG IX OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

ings read in the church which were not ac- 
cepted as a part of the canon. There were 
such books indeed, but they formed a class 
subordinate to the canon, and pre-supposing 
the formation of it. Of course there was not 
at the outset an immediate recognition of the 
equality of the Christian records with the hal- 
lowed books of the Old Testament ; but after 
the church had enlarged the canon by ad- 
mitting those sabred writings which had sprung 
from a common source, and had given them 
equal honor with those previously accepted, 
there came into view certain books which had 
more or less claim to recognition as canonical : 
and thus it came about that some were admit- 
ted to the prerogative of being read in the 
churches, without sharing the same honor 
which was given to those accepted as fully ca- 
nonical. At a later period the church found it 
to be for its interest to assign to these books, to 
which usage gave a kind of half-canonical char- 
acter, a rank equal to the highest. That this 
does not apply in the least to the earliest for- 
mation of the Christian canon is shown by the 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. 75 

Muratori Fragment which speaks of the Apoca- 
lypse of John and of Peter. We accept these, 
but the last named is not admitted by some of 
our scholars to the honor of being publicly read 
in church. This doubt expresses distinctly the 
want of full canonical authority which led to 
the rejection of the writing in question. Later 
usage can not do away with this ; and just as 
little can the fact that in some instances the 
direct relation of a paper to a single congrega- 
tion became a source of advantage to the com- 
mon church, as is testified by Dionysius of 
Corinth (Euseb., Hist. Eccl. iv. 23) in the case 
of the letters of Clemens and Soter to the Co- 
rinthians. In the Muratori Fragment already 
referred to, it is stated, toward the end of the 
Shepherd of Hernias, that he was to be recom- 
mended for private use, but not for public wor- 
ship, and that he was to be included neither in 
the number of prophets nor apostles. 

The manner in which Justin expresses him- 
self in the passage quoted above (first Apology, 
chap. 67) makes it impossible, in my opinion, 
to doubt that in his time the Gospels were ac- 



76 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

cepted as of canonical authority. We 'possess 
in fact a much earlier testimony "of this equal- 
ity in one of the generally accepted seven 
short letters, in that to Smyrna, £jie seventh 
chapter, where are the words, " It behooves ns 
to give heed to the prophets, and especially to 
the Gospel, in which the passion and the res- 
urrection are fully portrayed." Here too, as 
the reader observes, there is a manifest coup- 
ling of the prophets and the authors of the Gos- 
pels, i. e. the books which in their full extent and 
defined limits form the Gospel, and a proof 
that both were in common use in the church. 56 

These are proofs from the first quarter (wheth- 
er the year be taken as 107 or 115) and from the 
second quarter (139, or, as some suppose, ten 
years earlier) of the second century, that at 
that time the Gospels were held as of equal 
validity with the prophets, and were admitted 
to canonical authority, a place being assigned 
them directly after the prophetical books. 
What is not told us in detail respecting the 
various Gospels may be inferred from many 
other testimonies. I have already shown , from 



JUSTIN'S TESTIMONY. 77 

various passages of Justin Martyr's undisputed 
writings, that our Gospels, without the excep- 
tion of the fourth, that of John, were admitted 
to form one Gospel, and to be invested with 
canonical authority. Is it possible, therefore, for 
the opinion to be justified that at Justin's time 
other Gospels than ours were in use as having 
had a sacred origin, in spite of the fact that, 
decades after Justin, these, and no others, 
were in repute through the whole Christian 
church ? Does it not contravene all that we 
know of the origin of the .canon, that at the 
outset, and even in the aa*e of Justin, onlv 
Matthew. Mark, and Luke were regarded as 
canonical, and that John was subsequently 
smuggled in ? 

Accordino; to the views of manv. Justin was 
the author of the Letter to Dioo'netus : but those 
who assign to this an earlier date, and con- 
sider it the work of an older cotemporary of 
Justin's, are more correct. Although this short 
apologetic epistle contains no definite quotation 
from any one of the Gospels, it contains many 
allusions to evangelical passages, and especially 



78 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

to John. The words of the 'sixth chapter, 
" Christians live in the world, but are not of 
the world ; " those of the tenth, " for God has 
loved men, for whom he created the world ; 
. . . . to whom he has sent his only-begot- 
ten Son," contain almost unmistakable refer- 
ences to John xvii. 11, " these are in the 
world ; " 14, " the world hateth them, for they 
are not of the world ; " 16, " they are not of the 
world, even as I am not of the world ; " and to 
John iii. 16, " for God so loved the world that 
he gave his only-begotten Sou." 

But before advancing further we must come 
back to the Gospel of the Hebrews, whose use 
in connection with our synoptic Gospels is ren- 
dered probable by the language of Justin, by 
the pseudo-Clementine, and even by Tatian's 
Diatessaron, or Harmony of the Gospels, and 
testified by Eusebius (iv. 22 : 3) of Hegesippus. 
Does not this bring into great uncertainty the 
character of the earlier Gospel canon ? It cer- 
tainly appears to do so if the Gospel of the 
Hebrews is admitted to a place side by side 
with the synoptic Gospels, and be regarded 



GOSPEL OF THE HEBREWS. 79 

as an independent production, Against such a 
view there are a variety of considerations to be 
urged. I have already mentioned that the 
authorship of this Gospel was ascribed to Mat- 
thew. We shall see, further on, that at a very 
early period, in its original Hebrew form, it was 
held to be the work of Matthew, and that Greek 
editions, with many changes in the text, were 
in use among the juclaizing Christians. This 
has led to the result that the passages of the 
Gospel of the Hebrews which have been trans- 
mitted to us from antiquity, and more especially 
those which have recently been brought to light 57 
by the writer of these pages, manifest a striking 
parallelism with our Gospel of Matthew. All 
these circumstances lead to the conviction that 
at the beginning, and probably during the first 
half of the second century, the Gospel of Mat- 
thew and that of the Hebrews were regarded 
not as essentially different productions, but as 
different editions of the same document, and 
that by degrees greater light was diffused re- 
garding the variations in them. Thus Ireiueus 
states of the Ebionites, in two passages (i. 26 : 



80 ORIGIJSr OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

2 ; iii. 11 : 7), that they made use of the Gospel 
of Matthew; while Eusebius (iii. 27), probably 
referring to the first of these passages, corrects 
Irenssus's statement, and puts the Gospel of the 
Hebrews in the place of that of Matthew. Yet 
it happened, near the end of the fourth century, 
that the most learned theologian and most ex- 
perienced critic of his age, Jerome, while in 
possession of the Gospel of the Hebrews in the 
Syro-Chaldaic dialect of the country, and full 
of the recollections of an older tradition, be- 
lieved that it was the original text of Matthew 
fallen into his hands. After becoming more 
fully acquainted with it, and after translating it 
into Latin and Greek, he acknowledged that 
many believed that it was the work of Matthew 
himself. 

Thus far we have been concerned almost ex- 
clusively with the writings of men in whom the 
church, from the second century, in which they 
lived, onward, recognized venerated pillars of 
the faith. Yet at the same epoch there was a 
rich literature, which, in conjunction with what 
was ecclesiastical, put forth a rank growth, 



IBEXJSUS'S TESTIMONY. 81 

which elevated far above the simple Christian 
doctrine a system of speculations evolved from 
the schools of heathen and Jewish philosophy : 
I refer to the heretical views which became 
current, and which may be also known as the 
doctrines of the Errorists. Even from this lit- 
erature we derive convincing proofs that by the 
middle, or even before the middle of the second 
century, our Gospels had attained the highest 
degree of consideration. This is interesting 
not more for the light which it throws upon the 
earlier history of heresy than for that which it ; 
sheds Upon the age and the origin of our Gos- 
pels. In calling upon these errorists to give 
evidence respecting the Gospels, we have no 
less an authority than Irenaeus, that Bishop of 
Lyons of whom I have elsewhere spoken in de- 
tail. Irenaeus himself utters the expression, 
" So firmly are our Gospels grounded, that even 
the errorists are compelled to acknowledge 
their credibility, and each one of them must 
begin with them in order to lay the foundations 
of liis own system." 58 This is a judgment 
passed by the second half of the second century 



82 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

on the character of the first half. And this 
first half of the second century is just the period 
to which the opponents of the genuineness of 
our Gospels are accustomed to appeal. Now, are 
we to suppose that a man like Irenaeus, who lived 
only a few decades after the period to which I 
am referring, was not better acquainted with the 
facts than the scholars and professors of the 
nineteenth century ? The more the respect due 
to the true progress of science in our age, the 
less is owed to those scholars who employ their 
knowledge and acumeu for the purpose of 
thrusting at truth. The accuracy of what Ire- 
nseus testified to can be substantiated even to- 
day with facts ; and our tread is all the more 
secure if we do not withhold our belief. What 
the earliest Fathers have testified respecting the 
primitive errorists (and to the hints of the for- 
mer we owe the larger share of our knowledge 
about the latter), shows us, in the most con- 
vincing manner, how radically separate they 
were from the Gospels, and from the books 
which were considered holy by the church. 
Irenasus himself is one of the chief preservers 






VALEXTIXE. 83 

of these indications ; after him comes a work 

(discovered only twenty years ago) of a disci- 
ple of Irenaeus, Hippolytus by name, a man 
who lived so nearly cotemporaneously with 
those errorists as to warrant being received as 
equally good authority as Irenseus regarding 
them. 

One of the boldest and most gifted thinkers 
among those errorists was Yalentinus, 59 who 
came from Egypt to Rome about the year 140, 
and resided there for the twenty years succeed- 
ing. He undertook the task of writing a com- 
plete history % of those " supernal transactions 
which took place in the realm of the divine 
primeval Powers and supernatural Being before 
the sending of the onlv-be°:otten of the Father," 
hoping to be able to determine the better from 
the character of these events the nature and 
mission of the Son of God. In carrying out 
this stupendous design, he did not overlook the 
humble task of culling from John's Gospel a 
great number of conceptions and expressions, 
such as the Only-Begotten, the Word, Light, 
Life, Fullness, Truth, Grace, Saviour, Comfort- 



$4 ORIGW OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

er, and of using them for his purpose. There 
is in this such an undeniable connection be- 
tween the Gospel of John and the edifice of 
Valentine's construction that only two explana- 
tions of it are possible. Either Valentine made 
use of John or John of Valentine. , The latter 
alternative, according to my previously stated 
views of the second century, must be regarded 
as pure nonsense, and closer investigation into 
the matter confirms this. If science, hostile to 
the church, is able to reconcile itself to this 
fact, it passes judgment on itself. Irenaeus 
states explicitly that the sect of Valentine made 
the fullest use of the Gospel of John; 60 and he 
gives the most explicit demonstration that the 
first chapter of John was drawn upon for one 
of the main features of the Valentinian system, 
the doctrine of the first Ogdoade. 61 The state- 
ment of Irenseus confirms that of Hippolytus, 
for he cites expressions of John which Valentine 
had quoted. This is the most clearly the case 
with John x. 8 ; for Hippolytus writes, " Where- 
as the prophets and the law, according to Val- 
entine's belief, were filled with a subordinate 



VALENTINE. 85 

and foolish Spirit, Valentine says, ' The words 
of the Saviour are*" All who came before me 
are thieves and murderers/''"" 62 And as the 
Johaimean, so were the other Gospels used by 
Valentine. According to the statement of 
Irenseus, he considered (i. 7 : 4) the subordinate 
Spirit already- mentioned, which he termed 
Demiurgos and Taskmaster, to be represented 
by the centurion of Capernaum (Matt. viii. 9 ; 
Luke vii. 8) ; in the dead and resuscitated 
twelve-vear-old daughter of Jairus he recos;- 
nized an image of his " sub-wisdom " (Acha- 
moth), the mother of the Taskmaster (i. 8:2); 
in like manner in the history of the woman 
who had suffered for twelve years from an issue 
of blood, and was healed by the Lord (Matt. ix. 
20), he recognized the pains and restoration of 
his twelfth primeval spirit (iEon) i. 3:8; and 
the expression of Jesus recorded in Matt. v. 18 
he applied to the ten aeons hinted at in the 
numerical value of the Iota, the smallest letter. 
What do thev who denv the high antiquity 
of John's Gospel say to this ? They assert that 
all that pertains to John was not brought out 



86 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

by Valentine himself, but by his disciples. In 
fact, the expression is much more frequent in Ire- 
nssus " they say" — the followers of Valentine 
— than " he says," meaning Valentine himself. 
But who is wise enough to discriminate be- 
tween what the master said and what the disci- 
ples added, without echoing their master in the 
least? 63 We must here touch once more upon 
the passage of Irefieeus (iii. 11: 7) where he 
expresses himself respecting the relation of the 
heretics to the Gospels. After the sentence, 
" So securely are our Gospels founded, that 
even the errorists give testimony for them, 
and every one of these begins at the Gospels 
when he wants to try the foundations of his 
own system," he goes on to say, "For the er- 
rorists make exclusive use of the Gospel of 
Matthew, and are convinced from his pages 
alone of their error respecting the Lord. Mar- 
cion, however, avails himself of the mutilated 
Gospel according to Luke, and the very part 
which he retains makes his blasphemy against 
the only God apparent. Those who separate 
Jesus from Christ, and insist that it was Christ 



VALENTINE. . 87 

alone, and not Jesus, who suffered, assign a 
preference to the Gospel according to Mark. 
If they read it with real love of truth, they can 
be cured of their error ; but they who cleave to 
Valentine make the fullest use of John's Gos- 
pel for the confirmation of their doctrine of 
iEons ; and from this it can be seen that they 
teach nothing correctly, as we have shown in 
our first book/' Does this representation of 
Irenseus accord with the view that the use of 
the Gospel according to John began with the 
disciples of Valentine, and not with Valentine 
himself? Irenasus declares the use of the 
Johannean Gospel to have been a characteristic 
feature of Valentine's school ; and those names 
and conceptions already alluded to, which per- 
vaded the whole system, testify conviiicimdv to 
this : yet was all this a mere affix to the sys- 
tem ? So much respecting Irenseus. In Hip- 
polytus the expression is even more definite 
regarding Valentine. If now it is indisputable 
that the author does not always discriminate 
closely between the sect and the founder of the 
sect, have we an example of this in the case 



88 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

now under consideration ? In those instances 
where, in the course of a consecutive delinea- 
tion, we are called upon to consider now the 
founder and then the sect, is it not more logi- 
cal to conclude that the founder and the sect 
are to be taken as inseparably connected ? 

From one disciple of Valentine's, Ptolemaus 
by name, we receive a learned epistle, directed 
to " Flora." In it, in conjunction with several 
quotations from Matthew, is one from the first 
chapter of John : " All things were made by 
him (the Word), and without him was not 
anything made that was made, says the apos- 
tle." The method employed to rob such quota- 
tions of their force is to make the errorists 
who use these words as modern as possible ; if 
it be possible to trace them back only to the 
close of the second century, the proofs drawn 
from *them do not acomplish anything more 
than to substantiate what is already known, 
that at that time, as the opponents of the church 
gladly concede,' the church in its ignorance had 
fallen into the use of the canon of four Gos- 
pels. But how recent was Ptolemaus's time ? 



PTOLEMAUS. 89 



111 all the most ancient sources he appears as 
one of the most clistingished and most influen- 
tial disciples of Valentine's. As the epoch of 
the latter was about the vear 140, do we o;o too 
far in setting the time of Ptolemaus at about 
160 at the latest ? Irenaeus (in the second 
book) and Hippolytus name him in connection 
with Herakleon ; and, in like manner, Pseudo- 
Tertullian (in the affix to De praescriptiouibus 
haerticorum) and Philastrius place him directly 
after Valentine. Irenaeus in all probability 
wrote the first and second books of his great 
work before the year 180, and in both^ he con- 
cerns liimself very much with Ptolemaus. 

Here, however, we must bring in the testi- 
mony of Herakleon, the other very eminent 
disciple of Valentine. Herakleon wrote an en- 
tire commentary on the Gospel of John ; his 
work is known to us through the many frag- 
ments which Origen has woven into his own 
commentary on the same Gospel. From these 
fragments it is plain that Herakleon' s object 
was carried out with consummate skill, to base 
the assertions of his school on John: iu this he" 



DO ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

took the course which we have already re- 
marked in Valentine. Wholly absorbed in his 
own ideas, he found them reflected in a certain 
double sense of Scripture which he traced par- 
ticularly in John. In the passage, for example, 
iii. 12, " after that, he withdrew to Caperna- 
um," he held that there is an allusion to the 
domain of material and worldly things to which 
the Saviour condescended. The want of sus- 
ceptibility in this domain of sense he thought 
to be indicated by the fact that John has given 
us no account of what Jesus said or did while 
in Capernaum. The Samaritan woman at the 
well of Jacob was to him the representative of 
all souls which feel themselves drawn to what 
is divine ; the water of Jacob's well, which 
could not satisfy all spiritual necessities, was 
the transitory Judaic economy. The man 
whom the woman is required to summon is 
her spiritual complement, her pleroma, her an- 
gel tarrying in the higher world of spirits. The 
water which was offered to her indicates the di- 
vine life which was poured forth by the Saviour; 
the jar of the woman portrays her susceptibility 



herakleon; 91 

• 

for this divine life. Is not this commentary 
the most striking proof of the high authority 
which the Gospel of John must have had even 
then in the church, when the very errorists who 
had turned away from the church so willingly 
sought the confirmation of their own ideas in 
it ? And does noi> this show at a glance the 
absurdity of the theory which derives John's 
Gospel from the school of Valentine ? But the 
question recurs. How old is Herakleon ? It is 
one which has been urged with consummate 
skill against our ancient sacred literature ; and 
the answer has been given with incredible 
thoughtlessness, that he was the cotemporary 
of Origen and of Hippolytus. Unquestionably 
the oppressive weight of the matter under dis- 
cussion has been experienced, and hence has 
arisen the blindness to the evidences of antiquity 
which are still in existence. 64 

Irenasus mentions Herakleon in connection 
with Ptolemaus 65 in a way which shows him to 
have been a well-known representative of the 
school of Valentine. This acceptation of his 
words is all the more fully justified by the fact 



92 anwiN of the four gospels. 

that lie makes no further allusion to Herakleon. 
Clemens reminds us in the fourth book of his 
Stromata, written soon after the death of Corn- 
modus (193), of an interpretation given by 
Herakleon to Luke xii. 8, and terms him at the 
same time the most distinguished member 66 of 
Valentine's school. Origen states, at the com- 
mencement of his citations from Herakleon, 
that he was held to be a friend of Valentine's. 67 
Hippolytus alludes to him in vi. 29 hi the fol- 
lowing words: " Valentinus and Herakleon and 
Ptolemaus and the whole school of these disci- 
ples of Pythagoras and Plato." Epiphanius 
says (Haer. 41), " Cerdo (the same who, ac- 
cording to Irenaeus, iii. 4: 3, was with Val- 
entine in Rome) follows these (the Ophites, 
Kainites, Sethians) and Herakleon." Accord- 
ing to this evidence, Herakleon can not be as- 
signed to a date more modern than 150 or 160. 
The expression which Origen has used of his 
relations to Valentine must, according to the 
usages of speech, be understood as applicable to 
a personal relation. 68 Epiphanius has certainly 
erred (an occurrence not often met in him) in 



HERAKLEON. 93 

letting Cerdo, whose epoch must be set at about 
140, follow Herakleon ; but we have not the 
slightest right to suppose that he has made a 
mistake equal to the entire length of a man's 
life, and even more. 69 And on this account we 
may rejoice in the fact that a Gnostic partisan 
wrote a complete commentary on the Gospel 
of John soon after the middle of the second 
century. 

Had this Gospel then freshly appeared, and 
was it so flattering to the representatives of the 
Valentinian Gnosis that these gave it a cordial 
welcome ? Assuredly it was no light task for 
them to draw out of the simple words of John 
their own profound system. And it is not a 
little remarkable that the church thoroughly 
shared in the fancies of the errorists who had 
wandered so far out of the way. In addition 
to this, there were those who knew that John 
had duly died at Ephesus without leaving be- 
hind any such legacy as a Gospel, and that such 
a work as it was could not have lain hid till 
that late day in a corner. If the reader was 
not able to come to an understanding with him- 



$4 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR' GOSPELS. 

self in this wondrous thought-structure, he 
only confirmed this fact, that the commentary 
of Heralkeon is one of the strongest proofs that 
then, when it was written, the Gospel of John 
had long been revered as one of the hallowed 
writings of the church, so that it seemed to 
Herakleon a thing of special importance to show 
that this apostolic document, if it should be 
rightly interpreted, must be used to confirm the 
system of Valentine. 

While dealing with Valentine, or, according 
to the order of time, before reaching Valentine, 
we encounter Basilides, the period of whose 
activity occurs, according to Eusebius, at the 
epoch of Hadrian. With all his exhaustive 
speculations on the Primeval, and the secret, 
incomprehensible and lofty forces which spring 
from it with living impulse, with all his med- 
itations on the principles of light and dark- 
ness, life and death, his method of grasping 
the subject of faith allied him by a close bond 
with the adherents of the church, who stood on 
a lower platform, so far as profession is con- 
cerned, than was the case with Valentine. 



BASILIDES. 95 

One of his chief productions appears to be a 
commentary in twenty-four books on the Gos- 
pel. Eusebius (iv. 7) infers* the existence of 
this work from the statements of a extempora- 
neous opponent of Basilides, Agrippa Castor 
by name. Fragments from his book appear to 
have been preserved by Clemens, Origen, Epi- 
phanius, and the so-called Archelaus Disputa- 
tion. Has this work any relation to the sub- 
ject now under review ? It certainly appears 
to have. For the expression quoted by Euse- 
bius from Agrippa Castor, that Basilides wrote 
twenty-four books 70 " on the Gospel," almost 
compels us to turn our thoughts to those Gos- 
pels which, according to that earliest form of 
speech which conies to light even in Justin and 
Irenaeus, were designated as * ; the Gospel," even 
although the Gospel of the Hebrews, passing 
under the name of Matthew, was the substitute 
for our Matthew. That this view of the work 
of Basilides, on the skeptical side, is simply 
ludicrous, may be seen at a glance. Still it is 
in harmony with what we gather from the let- 
ters of Ignatius, from Polycarp, and from Jus- 



9& OBZGiy OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



tin, respecting the place which the Gospels 
held in the first half of tlte second century. 
The fragments wliich have been alluded to do 
not invalidate this view, but rather confirm it. 
So, too, what Clemens cites (Strom. 3 : 1) as 
from Basilides is closely connected with Matt. 
xix. 11, 12; T1 the quotation from Basilides, 
found in Epiphanius (Hser. 24: 5), is in direct 
alliance with Matt. vii. 6 ; 72 that found in Ori- 
gen in the commentary (lib. v. cap. 5) to the 
Epistle to the Romans begins with the words 
from Romans vii. 9 ; his words are, " For the 
apostle has said, ' Once I lived without the 
law.' " From this we infer the general connec- 
tion of Basilides with our New Testament. 73 

To this must be added what we learn through 
the Philosophumena of Hippolytus concerning 
Basilides. This work contains a detailed ac- 
count of him, having direct quotations from 
Paul 74 and Luke, 75 an allusion to Matthew, and 
two passages from John. In vii. 22, we read, 
L - And that is what is said in the Gospels, c He 
was the true Light, which lighteth every man 
that cometh into the world.' " John i. 9. 



BASILIDES. , 97 

Iii this passage the expression - in the Gos- 
pels" is entitled to its clue weight : it presup- 
poses the existence of the evangelical canon 
hinted at in the other forms of quotation, such 
as --the Scripture says." and "it is written.' 5 
Furthermore, in vii. 27. we find the expression 
** That everything has its time " is amply con- 
firmed by the words of the Saviour, when he 
says. " My hour is not yet come." John ii. 4. 
Does not this bring into perplexity those who 
are so certain that at the time of Basilides not 
a word of John's Gospel was written ? But no ; 
there is a ready way out of this difficulty. That 
to which the words. " in the Gospel it is said," 
give a happy indication, is made to mean, (be- 
cause, forsooth, no trace of a collection of Gos- 
pels can be traced back to that epoch.) that Hip- 
polytus is not dealing with the genuine Basi- 
lides. but with a Basilidian document which was 
the product of his own time. "Without enter- 
ing upon an investigation of that discrimina- 
tion which Hippolytus. who is so familiar with 
all that pertains to the ancient heretics, has 
made between his Basilides and the one yet 

7 



98 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

more ancient, we must at least grant that he 
has made distinct and explicit 76 reference to 
the older Basilides, and that he is not satisfied 
with his reader's accepting any other. Are we 
to suppose that it was a simple matter for the 
man who had been the disciple of Irenasus, and 
had died in the year 235, to err so singularly, 
while in the latest years of his life he was pre- 
paring a work drawn from first sources, as 
to ascribe to Basilides at the time of Hadrian 
what had been added during his own time by 
the followers of Basilides ? Are we able to de- 
termine with certainty when the old system left 
off and the new began ? And if we deny them 
both, and dare give credence to Hippolytus, we 
must admit that he has done us a great service 
in showing conclusively that Basilides and his 
school recognized the Gospels as books of ecclesi- 
astical authority long before the middle of the 
second century, and expressly made use of the 
Gospel of John for his ends. 

We come to the same result if we trace the 
relations of other Gnostic sects, the Naasenians 
and the Perates for example. The first derive 



THE XAASEXIAXS 99 

their name from the Hebrew word naas, a snake, 
corresponding to the Greek Ophites. While the 
last name was long used by Irena&us and others, 
that of Xaasenians began to be made current 
(aside from reference of Theodoret) T " through 
the Philosophumena of Hippolytus. That the 
Xaasenians were nothing but a fraction of the 
Ophites is not at all substantiated by the efforts 
made to support this hypothesis, and is wholly 
disproved by the statement of Hippolytus, who 
put the Xaasenians and the Perates at the 
head of the Gnostics, giving them precedence 
before Simon Magus, the Talentinians, and 
Basilides, but, as he states expressly (v. 6), as- 
signing them priority over all the other Gnos- 
tics. But while we place the opinion of Hip- 
polytus above the doubts which negative criti- 
cism has raised, we yet reckon among the most 
valuable comments on the Gospels the following 
excerpts made by Hippolytus from the writings 
of the Xaasenians living in the first half of the 
second century. In v. 8 he has this : " For all 
things, he asserts, (the writer of the Xaasenian 
document) have been made by the same hand, 



100 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

and without that hand is nothing made. And 
what is made in him 78 is Life." 79 In another 
passage : " That it is which we have learned 
of the Saviour, ' Except ye drink my blood and 
eat my flesh, ye shall not enter the kingdom of 
heaven (John vi. 53) ; Except ye drink the cup 
which I drink (Mark x. 38 ; Matt. xx. 22) ; 
Whither I go ye can not come.' " John viii. 
21. Soon after he says, " His voice we have 
heard indeed, but his form have we not seen." 
John iii. 8 ; v. 37. In the same connection 
we find, " Touching this our Saviour says, ' No 
man can come to me except my heavenly 
Father draw him.' " John vi. 44. Again, v. 9, 
" For, says he, God is a Spirit, and those who 
worship him must worship him neither on this 
mountain nor in Jerusalem, but in spirit." 
Of. John iv. 21, 24. Soon after we meet the 
words, " But if thou knewest who it is that asks 
thee, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he 
would have given thee living water." Connect- 
ed with these passages, so evidently from John, 
there are others from Matthew (vii. 6, 13, 14 ; 



THE NAASENIANS. 101 

iii. 10 ; xiii. 3, et sq.), and from Paul's Epistles 
(1 Cor. ii. 13, 14; 2 Cor. xii. 2, et sq.) 

We ought not to refrain from adding to these 
Naasenian citations from John and found in 
Hippolytus, what is given to us in the writings 
of the Ophites, in that pseudo-Tertullianie doc- 
ument (Append, to Text de praescr. haeret.) 
which those who lean to the Philosophumena 
believe to be drawn from a writing still more 
ancient. The quotation from John stands in 
the closest relation to that glorification of the 
serpent from which the sect of Naasenians de- 
rives its name ; and all the more forcibly are 
we compelled to assign to the founder of the 
sect, and not to some later effort from it, the 
application of the passage from John. In the 
pseudo-Tertullian (chap. 47 of the document 
de praescr. haer.) it is expressly stated, " To 
these must be added those heresiarchs who are 
called Ophites, i. e., Serpent-men. These pay 
such honors to the serpent that they place it 
even before Christ. For to the serpent, they 
say, we owe the beginning of our knowledge of 
good and evil. When Moses comprehended 



102 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the greatness and power of the serpent, he ele- 
vated one of brass, and all who looked upon it 
were made whole. Besides this, they assert 
that even Christ hints at the sacredness of the 
serpent, when lie says, ' And as Moses lifted up 
the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the 
Son of man be lifted up.' " John iii. 14. We 
meet the same passage, as I shall presently 
show, in the literature of the Perates. For just 
as from the writings of the Naasenians many 
passages were selected by Hippolytus, so were 
many also taken from those of the Perates, 
especially such as were originally derived from 
the Gospel of John... I need cite but two of these, 
Art. v. 12. " For the Son of man is not come 
into the world to condemn the world, but that 
through him the world might be saved." John 
iii. 17 ; v. 16. " And as Moses lifted up the 
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son 
of man also be lifted up." John iii. 14. 80 

I have as yet made no mention of Marcion, a 
man whose nature and activities were strangely 
divided between the faith of the church and the 
Gnostic heresy. It is the more necessary for me 



MAUCIOX. 103 

to allude to him because use has been made of 
his writings in a way entirely at variance with 
my own convictions. He was born at Sinope, 
on the Black Sea, the celebrated Pontine cap- 
ital of that time, in the early part of the second 
century. Subsequently to the year 128 he ap- 
pears to have inculcated his peculiar doctrines 
at Rome ; and, making it his special purpose to 
sever Judaism from Christianity, he undertook 
to eliminate from the apostolic writings every- 
thing which favored the former. In conse- 
quence of a statement which has come down to 
us from antiquity, that this writer made a col- 
lection of sacred writings (which may have 
taken place before the middle of the second 
century, between 180 and 140) , 81 and that he 
admitted into this collection only the Gospel 
of Luke and ten of Paul's Epistles, making such 
changes, moreover, in the text of them all as 
compelled them to suit his ideas, many scholars 
have supposed that this was the very first col- 
lection of sacred writings made by the church, 
and that the Gospel which he admitted into 
his collection was not Luke's, but was the 



104 ORIGIN OF THE FOUli GOSPELS. 

model which was followed when the one which 
we possess and call Luke's Gospel was written, 
and that he had no acquaintance with our other 
Gospels, including that ascribed to John. 

All three of these positions we hold to be 
utterly untenable. The first of them, which 
gives to Marcion the priority in making a col- 
lection of New Testament Scriptures for the 
use of the church, rests upon a complete ignor- 
ing of the development of the canon ; the ele- 
ments of this development, as my own re- 
searches reveal them, I shall take occasion to 
sum up and present on a future page. It also 
rests upon an ignoring of the point of view which 

Marcion took in relation to the church. Tak- 

• 

ing his stand upon the ground of Paul's expres- 
sions in the second chapter of the Epistle to the 
v Galatians respecting those departures from the 
y purity of the faith which were beginning to be 
manifested among the apostles themselves, he 
believed himself called, in the Pauline sense of 
the word, to the task of purging the Christian 
faith of Jewish elements. 82 In executing this 
undertaking nothing was more effective than 



■ 



MABCION. l(V/j 

the laying of a correcting hand upon those 
* writings which even then were accepted as the 
valid standards of belief among the adherents 
of Christianity. The correctness of this mode 
of procedure, employed even by the oldest 
fathers of the church, was confirmed in a strik- 
ing manner in his dealing with the Pauline 
Gospels. It is confirmed, moreover, by his treat- 
ment of Luke's Gospel, of which I shall have 
occasion to speak further on. And does it not 
harmonize entirely with his purpose, that he ex- 
cluded other Xew Testament writings from his 
canon ? It is possible that in one or another 
of the excluded documents the same anti-iudai- 
cal spirit would have led to like results ; yet it 
is perfectly conceivable, and is not open to our 
criticism, that in. his devotion to Paul he con- 
tented himself with accepting ten of his Epistles 
and that Gospel, whose author, owing to his 
being a companion and helper of Paul, owed 
a great deal to the influence exerted upon him 
by Paul, so that his work might almost be 
called the Gospel according to Paul. 83 

Very recently 54 the statement has been made 



106 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

with consummate naivete, that Marcion, so- 
journing in a remote province like Pontus, en- 
joyed a limited accessibility to Christian books, 
and that in making his collection he accumu- 
lated the greatest amount of materials that his 
scanty advantages allowed. The distance of 
that province, which at the time of Pliny com- 
prised a very large population of Jews as well 
as of Christians, from the two centers of 
Christian Asia Minor, Ephesus and Antioch, is 
not greater than from Naples to Milan ; and 
who in all the world, except a short-sighted 
professor, would draw the inference that a 
scholar, living in Pontus, during the fourth 
decade of the second century, making a collec- 
tion of the Christian sacred books, was not ac- 
quainted with all our Gospels ? The Epistles 
to the Corinthians and to the Romans were 
diffused and accepted ; and yet we are to be- 
lieve that the Gospel of John had not found 
its way from Ephesus to Sinope ! 85 Finally, the 
theory which rests on the remoteness of Pon- 
tus loses all its force in helping us solve the 
question under discussion, from the fact that 



MARCION. 107 

after Marcion went to Ronie, and took a high 
position there, he did not modify at all what 
he had done in forming his collection of sacred 
writings. At Rome he would assuredly have 
been able to supply the lack of materials from 
which he is alleged to have suffered at Pontus ; 
but we do not learn that he made any addition 
to his canon after coming to Rome. 

The second of the positions mentioned above, 
that the gospel of Marcion served as a model 
for that which we now accept as Luke's — a 
position which bears the clearest evidence from 
the outset of being the result of reckless ignor- 
ance — has been surrendered in our own time by 
its own defenders. Still it is asserted by some 
scholars that our Gospel according to Luke, 
like that of Marcion, is a modified form of one 
still older but subsequently lost ; that that of 
Marcion consequently did not spring from 
Luke's, but that they both originated in a com- 
mon source, to which Marcion remained true. 
Going in this direction one step further, they 
succeeded in finding in Marcion the oldest of all 
the Gospel Codices. This view, entirely apart 



108 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

from the last mentioned bold act of an intoxi- 
cated fancy, is in opposition to what Irenssus, 
Tertuliian, and Epiphanius say 86 regarding Mar- 
cion's gospel, which they possessed ; in conse- 
quence, however, of the ignorance prevailing re- 
specting Marcion's labors, and in consequence 
also of some indemonstrable hypotheses, it has 
gained a certain appearance of truth and conse- 
quent acceptance. The efforts to strike out the 
subsequent additions from our Gospel of Luke 
for the purpose of restoring the supposed older 
original, suffer from that arbitrariness which 
modern hypercriticism has assumed in all dis- 
cussion of the origin of the Gospels. The fact 
that Marcion gave no name 87 to his Gospel is 
made to give support to the claim that it is the 
only true Gospel, and is entitled to no influ- 
ence in directing our researches respecting this 
Gospel. 

We come to the third position, a refutation of 
which will throw light upon both of the others, 
Marcion is asserted to have not possessed the 
other Gospels, including that of John. If Mar- 
cion found the other Gospels in their main 



MARCION, 109 

form, just as we possess them now, in the pos- 
session of the church of his time, the view of 
the priority of his collection over the primitive 
canon of the church falls to the ground ; and 
equally frail is the hypothesis respecting the 
parallelism between the Gospel according to 
Marcion and our Luke, together with the con- 
sequences drawn therefrom respecting the au- 
thority of our canon in its present form ; and 
so there is gained no insignificant proof of the 
high antiquity and the genuineness of the Gos- 
pel according to John. 

What grounds have we for believing that 
Marcion was acquainted with our Gospels ? 
All that Irenaaus and Tertullian still more ex- 
plicitly have told us in reference to this matter 
makes it certain. For where Irenseus- (i. 27, 
2) writes concerning Marcion, that in oppo- 
sition to his pupils he held his trustworthi- 
ness greater than that of the apostles, who 
transmitted the Gospel (qui evangelium tradi- 
derunt) , inasmuch as he did not give the (whole) 
Gospel, but a part of the Gospel (non evangel.- 
ium, sed particulam evangelii), the meaning is, 



110 or'igw of the four gospels. 

according to Irenseus's use of language else- 
where (i. 27, 2), that Marcion gave his disciples 
only one of the Gospels, namely, that of Luke. 
That by the expressions " evangelium " and 
" particulam evangelii" we are to understand 
the Gospels, and not the Sermon on the Mount, 
is shown by another passage of his work (iii. 12, 
12), where, in reference to Marcion and other 
heresiarchs, we read, " The apostles have spread 
the Gospel abroad filled with Jewish prejudices 
(adhuc quae sunt Judaeorum sentientes) : and 
these are even more fair and wise than the 
apostles." Irenseus then goes on to say, " On 
this account Marcion and his adherents have* 
made it their aim to diminish the extent of the 
sacred books (ad intercidendas scripturas con- 
versi sunt), some of which they have entirely 
rejected, while they have reduced the size of 
Luke's Gospel and Paul's Epistles, insisting 
that the scriptures which they have retained 
and revised are the only ones which are to be 
accepted." These statements of Irenaeus have 
no twofold meaning, and are not susceptible of 
two interpretations. He evidently presupposes 



TERTULLIAN'S admissions. Ill 

a familiar knowledge on the part of the read- 
er of what he means by the " reducing of the 
sacred books," and by a " non-recognition " of 
some of them : and in order to understand what 
he means we have only to take his own point 
of view. 

Tertullian's admissions are much more to the 
purpose, although in his case we have to bear 
in mind that he is not writing for critical schol- 
ars, who are accustomed to avail themselves of 
every lack in a complete chain of evidence to 
help support their own views.. After citing 
(adv. Marc. iv. 3) Marcion's misuse of the sec- 
ond chapter of the Epistle to the Galatians 
(see a previous page), he says: " Connititur ad 
destruendum statum eorum evangeliorum quse 
propria et sub apostolorum nomine eduntur vel 
etiam apostolicorum, ut scilicet fidem quam illis 
adimit suo conferat." Among the Gospels which 
he designates as those " which bear the name 
of apostles, or men of apostolic character/' are 
to be understood the four which we possess, 
unless we purposely misinterpret Tertullian's 
words. Shortly before (iv. 2), he had in the 



112 ORIGIN OF TH£ FOUR GOSPELS. 

most definite language 88 designated the Gospels 
as books which had been written by actual apos- 
tles, such as Matthew and John, as well as by 
men of apostolic dignity, such as Mark and 
Luke. In order to escape the force of this strik- 
ing testimony of Tertullian, without accusing 
him of ignorance or falsification, an unfortunate 
attempt has been made to get rid of the diffi- 
culty by asserting that apocryphal Gospels are 
here meant, bearing unauthenticated names 
of apostles. Whoever listens for an instant to 
such a plea — and how one can is hardly to be 
imagined — must hold as not genuine the clos- 
ing words of Tertullian, " and expressly to as- 
cribe to his own testimony the credibility which 
he denies to theirs [the apostolic evangelists]." 
Tertullian repeats, moreover, respecting the pas- 
sages from Matthew's Gospel, " Marcion has 
stricken this from the Gospel." Oomp. adv. 
Marc. ii. 17 ; iv. 7. In the passage quoted on 
a previous page, de carne Chr. 2, the words, 
" tot originalia instrumenta Christi, Marcion, 
delere ausus es," are used in direct relation to 
the first chapters of Matthew and Luke. Adv. 



TERTULLIAN* S TESTIMONY. 113 

Marcion iv. 5 he complains of Marcion on the 
ground that instead of availing himself of Luke 
(a Gospel at second hand), he did not at once 
take up those whose authority (as the work of 
actual apostles) he knew to be higher. 89 De 
earn. Christ. 3, he says, " If thou hadst not pur- 
posely rejected or changed the reading of the 
writings which are opposed to thy system, the 
Gospel of John would surely have convinced 
thee in this matter." We find attention called 
finally to an epistle of Marcion, from the con- 
tents of which Tertullian establishes conclu- 
sively the fact that Marcion once accepted what 
he subsequently rejected. 90 

From all this it is established with the utmost 
certainty that Tertullian subjected Marcion to 
weighty reproaches for rejecting the Gospels 
(including John, once expressly named) which 
he had once accepted, and which Tertullian, in 
common with the church, continued to hold. 
An epistle of Marcion which he thought might 
possibly be disavowed by the followers of Mar- 
cion 91 served to show him what was the charac- 
ter of the man. The question naturally comes 

8 



114 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

up, Is Tertullian entitled to credibility in this 
affair ? 

It is now difficult to set aside the claims of 
those who have enacted the history of the prim- 
itive Christian church, on a basis of anti-ecclesi- 
astical prejudices and fancies. Polemical zeal, 
united with a certain passionate force of con- 
viction, sometimes carried the great African 
polemic too far, and made him unjust to the 
heretical opponents whom he had to confute. 
But is this general fact enough to warrant us 
in crying out that here he is making false in- 
ferences ? Men have even the hardihood to say 
— for shamelessness is now an extinct idea — 
that what Tertullian states with all correctness 
must be set to the account of " malicious per- 
secution." 92 That what Tertullian advances 
finds powerful support in Irenseus is plain ; but 
when the clearest and most evident matters are 
made to assume an obscure appearance, how 
much easier to bring under suspicion the pas- 
sages from Irenaeus, which hint at more than 
they openly express. Is anything plainer than 
that the reform 93 which Marcion endeavored to 



TERTULLIAN AND MARCIOX. Ho 

carry into the Gospels aimed specifically at cor- 
recting the canonical writings of the New Tes- 
tament? Did Tertullian need the help of 
schoolmasters more than we do, to know that 
64 evangelium " has other meanings than a writ- 
ten record ? And is the accusation brought 
against Marcion, that he rejected the apostolic 
records, which were well known to him, and 
which even bore the authenticated names of 
apostles, and that he made arbitrary changes in 
Luke as well as in the Pauline Epistles, any- 
thing else than empty inference ? And why is 
this attempt made ? Is not the object to- get 
rid of the truth, to undermine and destroy the 
force of one of the most important means of 
substantiating the primitive authority of our 
Gospels, more especially that of John? Those 
readers who are not specially engaged in prose- 
cuting learned researches need nothing more 
than what has already been given to qualify 
them for passing judgment on this matter. 
Such readers ought to use every occasion to as- 
certian what the character. of the learning is, 



116 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

which those professors sustain who make it their 
task to decry the authenticity of the Gospels. 

One of the most interesting phenomena in 
the church, and one of lasting influence, was 
Montanism. Its aim was to stem the "violent 
tide of Gnosticism, which was swamping the 
simple older faith with philosophic speculation, 
and sought to benefit men by giving them a 
deep inward and direct apprehension of divine 
truth. Taking a stand not only against foreign 
speculations but equally against the traditional 
deadness of an external ecclesiasticism, it, like 
Gnosticism, at length shot above the church 
through its exaltation of a fanatical spirit of 
prophecy, above the tranquil and orderly devel- 
opment of Christianity through doctrines of the 
new birth and spiritual illumination. 

If, following the object which I have in view, 
we ask what place Montanism took in relation 
to the writings of the New Testament, the 
greatest difficulty in the way of finding an an- 
swer lies in the Tact that we are scarcely in a 
position to make a general discrimination be- 
tween the form which had been given at the end 



MONTAKISM. 117 

of the second century by means of Tertullian's 
reformatory character, to the theological sys- 
tem then existing, and that which it had as- 
sumed at the outset in Syria. The account 
given by Eusebius, although drawn from frag- 
ments dating from the comparatively recent time 
of Marcus Aurelius (161 to 180), and that of 
Epiphanius, which aimed more distinctively at 
a confutation of opponents, are of a very in- 
complete character. The little which Irenseus 
has respecting this matter is hinted at in such 
various fashion that one hint only darkens the 
meaning of another. The scanty allusions in 
the Philosophumena of Hippolytus give rise to 
the suspicion that they relate rather to Tertul- 
lian's epoch than to the beginning of Montaii- 
ism in the year 150. 

The distinctive question which meets us here 

i 

is this : Has Montanism from the very first ap- 
propriated to itself, independently of John's 
Gospel, that prophetic spirit which was poured 
out, as is averred, on Montanus, his female com- 
panions, and his followers, and which stood in 
intimate connection with the Paraclete which 



118 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS.. 

was promised by the Saviour to his disciples 
(John xiv. 16, 26) ? The wanton character of 
Phrygian fanaticism leads us to suspect that 
the letter of Scripture was held in no regard ; 
and the extracts quoted in Eusebius (v. 16 to 
19), as well as the document of Epiphanius, 
contain nothing which can give us any light in 
this matter. It is quite otherwise with what 
Eusebius, and, long before him, Irenasus and 
Hippolytus record. 94 In Irenseus (iii. 11, 9) 
we read : " But others, in order to do away with 
the gift of the Spirit, which, according to the 
counsel of the Father, is poured out on all flesh, 
do not accept that promise made in the Gospel 
of John, that the Lord will send down the Para- 
clete, casting away not only this prophetic gift, 
but the Gospel as well which records its send- 
ing. It is truly their misfortune that, while 
granting that there are false prophets, they yet 
deny to the church the true and real gift of 
prophecy ; it is with them as with those who, 
because there are hypocrites in the church, with- 
hold themselves from all fraternal converse with 
the brethren." 95 The reference of this passage 



MONTANISM. 119 

to the Montanists we hold in common with 
Lucke and others as not at all made out; 96 but 
we regard the argument as conclusive, that the 
opponents of the Montanists, wittily called by 
Epiphanius, in a double use of language, Alo- 
gians, are meant. Epiphanius also bears evi- 
dence that the Alogians rejected the Gospel 
and the Apocalypse of John. But if it is a real 
characteristic of the opponents of Montanism, 
that they rejected John's Gospel, it is entirely 
probable that this was the result of the connec- 
tion between the prophetic Spirit of the Montan- 
ists and the Paraclete of that Gospel, It is not 
credible that the Alogians first brought this 
connection into view ; according to the words 
of Irenaeus, previously cited, it is certain that he 
was already of the opinion that the Alogians 
had rejected this Gospel simply because of this 
connection, and because it seemed to be drawn 
from John. Irenasus may be incorrect in his 
supposition that this was the only or the main 
ground for the Alogians' rejection 9T of this Gos- 
pel ; but Epiphanius bears witness that they 
could not account for the want of accordance 



120 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

between John's and the synoptic Gospels. To 
me, however, it seems to be necessarily inferred 
from the statements of Irenaeus that he presup- 
poses that the Montanists themselves brought 
their prophetical Spirit into harmony with the 
Paraclete of John's Gospel, and therefore made 
use of the latter document. Lastly, we have a 
statement *of Hippolytus hinted at ; it is found 
in the Philosoph. viii. 19, and runs as follows: 
" The Phrygian heresiarchs have been infatu- 
ated by Priscilla and Maximilla, whom they hold 
to be prophetesses because they aver that the 
Paraclete has entered into them." 

How then lies the matter? The short ex- 
tracts given by Eusebius from the writings of 
early opponents contain nothing in reference 
to the connection between the Montanists' 
prophetical Spirit and the Paraclete of John ; 
no more do the refutations of Epiphanius ; but 
Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Tertullian, 98 and Eusebius 
are united in averring that this connection did 
exist ; and the fact that the Alogians rejected 
the Gospel of John, according to the statement 
of Irenaeus, assuredly harmonizes with the 






MONTANISM. 121 

honor which was paid by the Montanists to this 
Gospel. 

Yet there has been the same effort to pervert 
the relation of Montanism to John's Gospel as 
in the system of Valentine ; at least the suspi- 
cion has been bruited that that Gospel could 
only have emanated from the same circle of 
theological ideas and be the result of the same 
movement which gave rise to Montanism. What 
a chaotic confusion of thoughts is there in such 
a charge as this ! what a senseless opposition to 
John's credibility is betrayed in the effort to 
pervert and falsify the evidences which go to es- 
tablish his authenticity ! Let us suppose for a 
minute that John's Gospel sprang into exist- 
ence like Montanism about the year 150. De- 
spite the fact that the lateness of its appearance 
must make it seem like the work of a pious 
fraud, and that in its whole structure and in 
its details it was unlike the earlier Gospels, the 
church, no less than those who opposed the 
church, and especially the Montanists, accepted 
it with full confidence. To one little sect alone 
did it fall to raise difficulties between the older 

5 



122 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

* . 

Gospel and the more recent one, and in conse- 
quence to reject the latter, and yet without 
gaining either credit or prominence by the act. 
And is it true that there is clear accordance be- 
tween the Montanist doctrine and that of John's 
Gospel ? Not in the least. Aside from the 
fact that the points where they harmonize re- 
late almost exclusively to the idea of the Para- 
clete (an idea which appears in the Gospel 
without any full development, while in Mon- 
tanism we are directed rather to the catholic- 
izing notions entertained by Tertullian than 
to those held earlier), the divergence be- 
tween Montanism and John's Gospel is as great 
as that between an ecclesiastic prototype and 
a heretical copy. 

In addition to this, the opponents of Montan- 
ism already named give noticeable testimony 
against this and similar depreciations of John's 
Gospel in the middle of the second century, at 
the time of the Montanist movement. They 
knew nothing about the story of the Gospel of 
John being a new thing first ushered into be- 
ing in their time ; they ascribed both the Gos- 



MONTANISM. 123 

pel and the Apocalypse as unworthy of the 
church (Epiph. haer. 51, 3) to Corinth, a co- 
temporary of John." The very opponents of 
the book, therefore, did not doubt about its age, 
nor bring it under suspicion ; they always as- 
cribed it to the epoch in which John lived. 
Does not this show that the church had long 
used that Gospel, and that on that account 
there was no opening for objections to it on the 
ground of age ? It is to be noticed at the same 
time that the same heretics consider the Gos- 
pel and the Apocalypse as coherent productions, 
and that they acted as one man in disowning 
John, and in claiming Corinth as the author. 
The authorship of the Apocalypse, expressly 
stated by Justin to be the production of John, 
has not been doubted even by the Tubingen 
critics to be the work of John. From the acts 
of the anti-Montanists, however, it is to be in- 
ferred that the conviction and usage of the 
church' agreed in ascribing both writings, the 
Gospel and the Apocalypse, to John. 

In this way, as the reader can perceive, even 
the heretics of the first half of the second cen- 

- 



124 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

tury and the beginning of the second half do 
good service in helping us ascertain the truth 
regarding the antiquity of our Gospels. We 
hold it impossible, without resorting to sophistry 
and falsification, to do away with the testimony 
which these heretics bear to the credibility of 
our Gospels, and especially to that of John. 

We now advance a step beyond the church 
to the territory where we encounter the armed 
opponents of Christianity, the men to whom 
the whole preaching of the cross was folly and 
an offense. At that very time when the Gnos- 
tic errorists were throwing the church into 
into such confusion, it happened that one 
of these opponents, Celsus by name, wrote a 
book full of mockery and scorn at Christianity. 
This production perished long ago ; but so far 
from doing any harm to Christianity, it proved 
to be a great gain, for it impelled Origen to write 
his powerful and learned defense of Christian- 
ity. From Origen's work we draw enough to 
make us certain that in his attacks on the 
Christian faith Celsus made ample use of our 
Gospels, and that he drew from them the mate- 



CELSUS. 125 

rials which he needed in making his attacks. 
In what he says respecting the appearance of 
angels at the resurrection of Jesus he probably 
refers to all four of the Gospels ; for he says 
that according to some there were two angels, 
according to others, four at the grave (5, 56). 
Origen supposed that the first referred to Luke 
and John, the last to Matthew and Mark. Pro- 
ceeding in a different and more definite way to 
work, he drew into the circle of his criticism 
various passages from the synoptical Gospels, 
especially Matthew's, and also some from that 
of John. Among those from the synoptical Gos- 
pels may be mentioned the account of the wise 
men from the East (whom he calls Chaldeans), 
the story of the slaughter of the children by 
Herod (1, 58), the flight into Egypt at the bid- 
ding of the angel (1, 66), the appearance of the 
dove at the baptism (1, 40), the son of the Vir- 
gin (1,40), the direction which Jesus gives to 
his disciples (Matt. x. 23), "when they perse- 
cute you in this city, flee ye into another " (1, 
65), the grief at Gethsemane (2, 24), the thirst 
on the cross (2, 37), the saying of Jesus that it 



126 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

is easier to go through the eye of a needle, etc. 
— which he supposes to be a motto of Plato in a 
changed form (6, 16), — the command of Jesus 
(Matt. v. 39 ; Luke vi. 29), " Whosoever shall 
smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the 
other also," which he also supposes to be a modi- 
fied Platonism. Examples of a reference to John 
are, his statement (1, 67) that the Jews in the 
temple demanded a sign of Jesus (John ii. 18), 
that he accepts John's expression " Logos" to 
designate Jesus as the Word of God (2, 31), that 
he ridicules (2, 36) the statement that at the 
crucifixion blood issued from Jesus' side (John 
xix. 34), and that he asserts (2, 59) that after 
his resurrection Jesus displayed his pierced 
hands as the token of what he had endured 
(John xx. 27). It can not be claimed, in view 
of this, that Celsus drew all these assertions from 
living Christian tradition ; for he himself is the 
very one to lay stress upon the fact that he 
drew upon the writings of the Christians. His 
words were, as cited literally by Origen (2, 74), 
from his own writings : " And this we have 
drawn from your own books ; we want no fur- 



CELSUS. 127 

ther evidence, and you are impaled on your 
own sword." Origen remarks appositely that 
Celsus has indeed brought forward much that 
was not in the Gospels, especially some blasphe- 
mous reports about Mary, and some idle stories 
about the infancy of Christ; these may be found 
alluded to in the first book which Origen wrote 
contra Celsum 100 (1, 28 and 32). But in 
the course of his work Celsus carried out his 
idea 101 of adhering closely to the " writings of 
the disciples of Jesus." And plainly this was 
done out of respect to the fact that these writ- 
ings, and these alone, had authority in the 
church. 

The question here arises, What relation to the 
witness which Celsus bears to the authority of 
our Gospels is sustained by that criticism which 
does not accept that authority, so far especially 
as John is concerned ? As that evidence can 
not be impugned, unbelieving scholars bring 
into -use again here that modernizing system 
which crops into view in Herakleon, to the per- 
fect shame of him who first made it current. 
As in Herakleon, so here, the story runs, Celsus 



128 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



i 



was the co temporary of Origen. But when was 
that important fact ascertained ? Drawing 
from Origen himself, Dr. Yolkmar 102 says, "Has 
not Origen declared at the close of his work 
(8, 76) that the same Celsus announced that he 
would publish a work of more positive charac- 
ter, and that we must wait to see whether he 
would accomplish the undertaking ? Origen 
(254) may have, written his book against Celsus 
about the middle of the first half of the third 
century. Nothing is plainer than that Cel 
sus, if he were alive at that time and giving 
men to understand that a new work might be 
expected from his pen, has no importance to us 
in helping us settle this matter. But even here 
we have to deaJL with nothing but a piece of 
wretched trickery, with real poverty of resources 
on the part of the critics whom I complain of. 
For the statement borrowed from the close of the 
work against Celsus rests upon gross ignorance 
or upon purposed deception. The words of 
Origen to his patron Ambrosius, who had stim- 
ulated him to write the whole Apology, run 
after this wise : " Know that Celsus promised 



CELSUS. 129 

[unquestionably in his book directed against 
Christianity, and opposed by Origen] to write 
still another work in which " . . . . "If now 
he has not written this, in spite of his promise 103 
it is enough for us to answer him with these 
eight books. But if he has done this, and com- 
pleted 104 his later work, do you hunt it up and 
send it to me, that I may answer it," etc. The 
difficulty to account for is in the words, "we 
must wait to see whether he would accomplish 
the undertaking." But at the outset, in the 
very first book, Origen says, " I do not know of 
a single Christian whose faith is in peril of be- 
ing endangered by Celsus, a man no longer 
among the living, but who has been a long 
time numbered among the dead." They for- 
got, of course, to cut out this passage with the 
scissors which had been so effectually applied 
to Polycarp. In that same first book Origen 
says, " We have learned that there have been 
two men bearing the name of Celsus, the first 
under Nero, the second [i. e. ours] under Ha- 
drian and later." It is not impossible that 
Origen erred in identifying his Celsus with the 



130 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

Epicurean who lived "under Hadrian and la- 
ter;" but it is impossible to make the Celsus of 
whom Origen thus speaks, his cotemporary. 
Could Origen have made Celsus in his first book 
to be " under Hadrian and later" (117 to 138), 
and in the eighth have said of the same man, " we 
must wait to see [about 225] whether he will 
accomplish his undertaking? " So long there- 
fore as we get no more reliable information re- 
specting Celsus, we must remain content with 
believing that he wrote his work about the mid- 
dle of the second century, perhaps between 150 
and 160 ; 105 and that his testimony in favor of 
the synoptic and Johannean Gospels dates from 
that period, — a fact of very great weight in en- 
abling us to determine the early existence of 
the evangelical canon. 

With this result, however, we by no means 
reach the limits of the history of Apologies for 
the Gospels. In order to complete this depart- 
ment of our subject, we now enter upon a pecu- 
liar branch of the literature of the same age 
with that with which we have been dealing, — 
a branch which, after long neglect, is in our 



APOCRYPHAL LITERATURE. 131 

day claiming new and respectful attention ; 
viz., the New Testament apocryphal literature. 
This holds a certain position midway between 
the literature of the church and that of the 
heresiarchs : at any rate, many of its features 
served the ends of the former through the use 
of the latter. It is necessary, however, that I 
should instruct the reader what the theologians , 
understand by the term " apocrypha." The 
apocryphal writings of the New Testament — for 
it is of these only that I speak — are writings 
which aimed to take their place on the same 
footing with the writings of the New Testa- 
ment, but which were rejected by the church. 
They bore on the face of them the names of 
apostles, or of other eminent men ; but these 
names have been misappropriated by unknown 
writers for the purpose of recommending what 
they wrote. The Apocrypha were written, partly 
in order to develop in arbitrary fashion what 
their authors had drawn from Scripture, partly 
to incorporate unauthenticated accounts of the 
Saviour, Mary, Joseph, and the apostles, and 
partly to give point and efficacy to heretical 



132 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

opinions directed against Holy Writ. The 
church was warranted, therefore, in excluding 
them from her accepted writings. It is true 
that they have been revered as authentic by 
many from the earliest times ; and on this ac- 
count they have a varied interest 106 to readers. 
I have indicated elsewhere in what sense I 
. propose to use them : they only support and 
strengthen our evidence of the very early origin 
of our Gospels. We are, of course, independ- 
ent of the question how old the apocrypha are ; 
and this has left an opening into which opponents 
have pressed, hoping to cut us off on this side. 
But we have come to the result that the two 
portions of the apocryphal Gospels which are 
extant now, known as the Protevangel of 
James and the Acts of Pilate, must have been 
written within the three first decades of the 
second century, and that the main substance of 
those works (though marred by many changes 
in the text) is now in our possession. 

The chief, if not the only, evidence for the 
age of both of these writings is found in Justin. 
And first with regard to the Protevangel of 



APOCRYPHAL LITERATURE. 133 

James. In Justin's Dialogue with the Jew 
Tryphon, and in his first Apology, we find in 
the statements respecting the birth of Jesus 
and the annunciation traces of a knowledge, 
and of the influence, of the book of James. 
Justin relates in the Dialogue (cap. 78) that 
the birth of Jesus occurred in a cavern near 
the village, there being no room at the inn. 
This statement, which confirms the account of 
Luke instead of contradicting it, is contained 
in the book of James, and is woven into the 
substance Of the whole history of the event. 
Still, it is not to be overlooked that. Justin 
appropriates only this single fragment respect- 
ing the birth in the cave, and in the rest fol- 
lows Luke rather than the pseudo-James. The 
statement respecting the want of room in Beth- 
lehem coheres strictly with the narrative of 
Luke, but is not in accord with that of the 
pseudo-James. Similarly, the annunciation is 
plainly hinted in the first Apology, although 
with a free following of Luke, with the mere 
difference that the words, " For he shall save 
his people from their sins," are connected with 



134 ORIGIN OF THE FOUB GOSPELS. 

the words directed to Mary, " And thou shalt 
call his name Jesus." In Luke" they are want- 
ing altogether, and in Matthew they belong to 
the message announced to Joseph. And have 
we not a recognition of what is apocryphal in 
Justin, since, at the close of his exposition, he 
appeals to those who have declared everything 
respecting our Saviour Jesus Christ ? But no, 
that can not be said ; for the whole account 
of Justin, as already remarked, corresponds 
strictly to Luke, and not to the Protevangel, 
only with this difference, that the passage indi- 
cated varies from the Protevangel, Matthew 
giving the words as announced to Joseph, and 
Justin as addressed to Mary. This feature 
must, in my opinion, be ascribed to the perusal 
of the Protevangel ; and in the recollection of 
Justin it connected itself with Luke's account 
without his own consciousness of the fact. It 
is unmistakable that the whole quotation was 
made from memory. 107 In the Dialogue (chap. 
100), the annunciation made to Mary is cited, 
and the words spring from Luke, and not from 
the Protevangel. 108 At the same time, there is 






THE PEOTEVANGEL. 135 

a single extract bearing relation to ' the mental 
state of Mary, which seems to have sprung 
from a recollection of a passage in the Prote- 
vangel ; only Justin has connected it with the 
reply of Mary to the address of the angel, while 
the Protevangel joins it to a priestly blessing 
which she received just on the' point of setting 
out to visit Elizabeth. 109 • 

But' is there no objection urged against our 
endeavor to substantiate an acquaintance of 
Justin with the Protevangel ? Certainly there 
are lost writings which are brought into requi- 
sition. Out of one of these it is supposed that 
Justin can just as well have drawn as that the 
Protevangel be derived from it. The Gnostic 
yawa MctQiag (de generatione Marias), and still 
more the Gospel of Peter, 110 have been thought 
to be that ancient work freshly brought to 
light. And this brings us into renewed contact 
with an old acquaintance, with that same fac- 
ulty of making new discoveries of which I have 
already had occasion to speak. In order to 
escape the force of a work lying plainly before 
our eyes, the inferences from which are un- 



136 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

mistakable, it is held in the light of a copy of a 
perished work, of which we have received from 
the past little but the title and a few meager 
extracts, which render it impossible to set solid 
facts over against the play of fancy. Yet let 
us look into this matter as closely as we 
can. Epiphanius 111 has given the first impulse 
toward bringing the Gnostic production already 
mentioned into relation with the Protevangel, in 
citing something of what he calls the " shock- 
ing " statements of the work; namely, that 
there appeared to Zacharias in the temple the 
vision of a man wearing the form of an ass. 
Upon which Zacharias went up to him and tried 
to say, Woe to you ! whom are you worship- 
ing ? but could not utter the words, the man 
seen in the vision having struck him dumb. 
But when his mouth was opened, and he had 
communicated to others what he had seen, he 
was instantly put to death. This fragment 
from the lost book is enough, I should think, 
to identify its source. And is there that in it 
which enables us to determine that it was the 
basis of the Protevangel ? The last has noth- 



THE PEOTEVANGEL. 137 

ing in common wkh the first, excepting the 
slaughter of Zacharias, but wholly on another 
ground, and under altogether different condi- 
tions. But there is help at hand against accu- 
mulating difficulties respecting the connection 
of both writings. The way is to conjure up 
and thrust into prominence a work which 
claims to have given rise to that of James. 
From the Gnostic book relating to Mary sprang 
this Gnostic- tinged- — now unfortunately lost — 
primitive foundation of the pseudo-James; and 
from this again the work of our catholicizing 
James. 112 This ingenious solution may not 
have quite satisfied even him who hit upon it, 
and hence he thought out and gave preference 
to another combination. In the passage where 
Origen alludes to the work of James, he men- 
tions the Gospel of Peter ; for he says the 
brothers of Jesus were regarded by some, who 
followed the tradition of the Gospel of Peter, 
or that of James's work, as if thev had been 
the «ons of Joseph by a previous marriage. 113 
Now, according to this new combination, the 
question is asked, Can not the Gospel of Peter,- 



138 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

or the early history given in it, be the basis of 
the Protevangel ? The primitive history in the 
Gospel of Peter rests exclusively upon the pas- 
sage of Origen relating to the brothers of Jesus 
as the sons of Joseph by an earlier marriage. 
With reference to this, we read without going 
further. That there was such a primitive his- 
tory, can, according to the statement of Origen, 
be regarded as beyond doubt. From the same 
passage of Origen, the conclusion is drawn that 
" in the Protevangel of James the primitive his- 
tory of the Gospel of Peter is contained." But 
do the words of Origen, " while they followed 
the tradition of the Gospel of Peter, or that of 
the work of James," warrant the inference in 
the least that the latter coincides and gives 
support to the primitive history of the Gospel 
of Peter ? But who is able to impose a check 
upon the unbridled fanaticism of theorists ? 114 
That we are now in possession of nearly fifty 
Greek manuscripts, comprising, among other 
things, a Syrian copy of the work under discus- 
sion, dating from the sixth century, and that 
no one of the evidences of its antiquity, from 



THE PROTEVANGEL. 139 

Origen down, is contradictory to the text of 
these manuscripts, gives us assuredly a good 
right to hold fast to the conviction that this 
was the writing so familiar to the ancients, 115 
and so much used by them. Is not that the 
most untenable of hypotheses, that our work 
was derived from one which was used by the 
ancients where it coincides with our own, but 
of which not a trace remains? And what other 
end does this hypothesis subserve than this, to 
set aside the inferences which are drawn from 
the book of James, and applied not only to the 
Christian literature of the second century, but 
more especially to the history of the Gospel 
cause ? I trust it will not impel those who do 
not share these views, to regard hypotheses 
which have such a basis to rest upon as some- 
thing else than they really are. In opposition 
to them, I am still justified in insisting that the 
undeniable connection between Justin and sev- 
eral passages of the so-called Proto-Gospel pre- 
supposes his acquaintance with this very pro- 
duction. The book of James stands, in its 
whole tendency, in such a relation to our 



140 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

canonical Gospels, that the latter must have 
been diffused a long time, and must have been 
accepted a long time before the former was dis- 
covered. The allusions of Matthew and Luke 
to the virgin mother of the Lord were unable 
to prevent the belief in a real son of Joseph 
and Mary, — an idea consonant with the taste of 
the Judaized Christian heresiarchs : the men- 
tion of the brothers of Jesus in the synoptic 
Gospels appeared to bear evidence against Mat- 
thew and Luke ; learned Jews brought against 
the Christians the charge of arbitrarily chang- 
ing the meaning of Isaiah, and making him 
support the notion of a virgin mother : Jewish 
hostility even went so far as to assert that Jesus 
was the illegitimate son of one Panther a, and 
heathen skeptics quoted Greek fables about 
sons being born from virgins, in order to dis- 
credit the evangelical account. In such a time 
as was the first half of the second century, 
nothing could promise a better support to the 
Gospel narrative than a production like the one 
named after James, furnished with irrefragable 
historic testimony as to the lofty destiny of 



THE ACTS OF PILATE. 141 

Mary from her birth, as to her motherhood 
while a virgin, and as to a relationship of Mary 
to Joseph exalted far above the usual relations 
of marriage. 116 Now, if this work of James 
falls within the first three decades of the sec- 
ond century, the composition of the Gospels of 
Matthew and Luke, to which the reference of 
James's work limits itself, can not be set later 
than the last decades of the previous century. 

It is the same with the second apocryphal 
work brought under review above, the so-called 
Acts of Pilate, only with the difference that 
they refer as much to John as to the synoptical 
Gospels. Justin, in like manner as before, is 
the most ancient voucher for this work, which 
is said to have been written under Pilate's 
jurisdiction, and, by reason of its specification 
of wonderful occurrences before, during, and 
after the crucifixion, to have borne strong evi- 
dence to the divinity of Christ. Justin saw as 
little reason as Tertullian and others for believ- 
ing that it was a work of pious deception from 
a Christian hand. On the contrary, Justin 
appeals twice to it in his first Apology in order 



142 ORIGIN' OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

to confirm the accounts of the occurrences 
which took place at the crucifixion in accord- 
ance with prophecy, and of the miraculous 
healings effected by Christ, also the subject of 
prophetic announcement. He cites specifically 
(chap. 35) from Isaiah Ixv. 2, and lviii. 2 : " I 
have spread out my hands all the day unto a 
rebellious people, which walketh in a way that 
was not good." . . . " They ask of me the 
ordinances of justice : they take delight in ap- 
proaching to God. Further, from the twenty- 
second Psalm: " They pierced my hands and my 
feet. . . . They parted my garments upon 
them, and cast lots upon my vesture." With 
reference to this, he remarks that Christ fulfilled 
this ; that he did stretch forth his hands when 
the Jews crucified him, — the men who con- 
tended against him, and denied that he was the 
Christ. " Then," he says further, " as the 
prophet foretold, they dragged him to the judg- 
ment-seat, set him upon it, and said, c Judge us.' 
The expression, however, 'they pierced,-' etc., 
refers to the nails with which they fastened his 
hands and his feet to the cross. And after they 



THE ACTS OF PILATE. 143 

had crucified liim they threw lots for his cloth- 
ing, and they who had taken part in the act of 
crucifixion divided it among themselves." To 
this he adds : " And you can learn from the 
Acts, composed 117 during the governorship of 
Pontius Pilate, that these things really hap- 
pened." Still more explicit is the testimony 
of Tertullian. It may be found in the Apolo- 
geticus (chap. 2), where he says that out of 
envy Jesus was surrendered to Pilate by the 
Jewish ceremonial lawyers, and by him, after 
he had yielded to the cries of the people, given 
over for crucifixion ; that while hanging on the 
cross he gave up the ghost with a loud cry, and 
so anticipated the executioner's duty; -that at 
that same hour the day was interrupted by a 
sudden darkness ; that a guard of soldiers was 
set at the grave for the purpose of preventing 
his disciples stealing his body, since he had 
predicted his resurrection, but that on the third 
day the ground was suddenly shaken, and the 
stone rolled away from before the sepulcher ; 
that in the grave nothing was found but the 
articles used in his burial ; that the report was 




144 ORIGW OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

spread abroad by those who stood outside, that 
the disciples had taken the body away ; that 
Jesus spent forty days with them in Galilee, 
teaching them what their mission should be, 
and that, after giving them their instructions 
as to what they should preach, he was raised 
in a cloud to heaven. Tertullian closes this 
account with the words, " All this was reported 
to the emperor at that time, Tiberius, by Pi- 
late, his conscience having compelled even him 
to become a Christian." 

The document now in our possession corre- 
sponds with this evidence of Justin and Tertul- 
lian. Even in the title it agrees with the ac- 
count of Justin, although, instead of the word 
acta, which he used, and which is manifestly 
much more Latin than Greek, a Greek expres- 
sion is employed, which can be shown to have 
been used to indicate genuine Acts. 118 The 
details recounted by Justin and Tertullian are 
all found in our text of the Acts of Pilate, with 
this variation, that nothing corresponds to what 
is joined to the declaration of the prophet, 
" They dragged him to the seat of judgment, 



THE ACTS OF PILATE, 145 

and set him upon it. and said/"' etc. : besides 
tins, the casting lots for the vesture is expressed 
simply by the allusion to the division of the 
clothes. TTe must give even closer scrutiny to 
one point. Justin alludes to the miracles 
which were performed in fulfillment of Old Tes- 
tament prophecy, on the lame, the dumb, the 
blind, the dead, and on lepers. In fact, in our 
Acts of Pilate there are made to appear before 
the Roman governor a palsied man who had 
suffered for thirty-eight years, and was brought 
in a bed by voiing men. and healed on the Sab- 
bath day; 113 a blind man cured by the laying 
on of hands : a cripple who had been restored ; 
a leper who had been cleansed ; the woman 
whose issue of blood had been stanched ; and 
a witness of the raising of Lazarus from the 
dead. Of that which Tertullian cites, we will 
adduce merely the passage found in no one of 
our Gospels, that Jesus passed forty days after 
his resurrection in company with his disciples 
in Galilee. This is indicated in our Acts of 
Pilate, at the end of the fifteenth chapter, where 

the risen man is represented as saying to Jo- 
10 



146 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

seph, " For forty days go not out of thy house ; 
for behold, I go to my brethren in Galilee."* 

Every one will perceive how strongly the 
argument that our Acts of Pilate are the same 
which Justin and Tertullian read is buttressed 
by these unexpected coincidences. The asser- 
tion recently made 120 requires consequently no 
labored contradiction that the allusions to both 
men have grown out of their mere suspicion 
that there was such a record as the *Acts of 
Pilate, or out of the circulation of a mere story 
about such a record, while the real work was 
written as the consequence of these allusions 
at the close of the third century. What an 
uncommon fancy it requires in the two men to 
coincide so perfectly in a single production as 
is the case in the Acts to which I am now re- 
ferring ! And are we to imagine that they re- 
ferred with such emphasis as they employed to 
the mere creations of their fancy ? 

The question has been raised with more jus- 
tice, whether the production in our possession 
may not have been a copy or free revision of 
the old and primitive* one. The modern change 



THE ACTS OF PILATE. 147 

in the title has given support to this conjecture, 
for it has occasioned the work to be commonly 
spoken of as the Gospel of Nicodemus. But 
this title is borne neither by any Greek manu- 
script, the Coptic-Sahidian papyrus, nor the 
Latin manuscripts, with the exception of a few 
of the most recent. 121 It may be traced only sub- 
sequently to the twelfth century, although at a 
very early period, in one of the two prefaces 
attached to the work, Nicodemus is mentioned 
in one place as a Hebrew author, and ki an- 
other as a Greek translator. But aside from 
the title, the handwriting displays great varia- 
tion, and the two prefaces alluded to above 
show clearly the work of two hands. Notwith- 
standing this, however, there are decisive 
grounds for holding that our Acts of Pilate 
contain in its main substance the document 
drawn from Justin and Tertullian. The first 
of this to be noticed is, that the Greek text, as 
given in the version most widely circulated in 
the manuscripts, is surprisingly corroborated 
by two documents of the rarest character, and 
first used by myself, — a Coptic-Sahidian papyrus 



148 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

manuscript, and a Latin palimpsest, — both prob- 
ably dating from the fifth century. Such a doc- 
umentary confirmation of their text is possessed 
by scarcely ten works of the collective Greek 
classic literature. Both of these ancient writ- 
ings make it in the highest degree probable 
that the Egyptian and Latin translations which 
they contain were executed still earlier. But 
could a work which was held in great consider- 
ation in Justin's and Tertullian's time, and down 
to the commencement of the fourth century, 
and which strenuously 122 insists that the Empe- 
ror Maximin caused other blasphemous Acts of 
Pilate to be published and zealously circulated, 
manifestly for the purpose of displacing and 
discrediting the older Christian Acts, — could 
such a work suddenly change its whole form, 
and from the fifth century, to which in so ex- 
traordinary a manner translators wholly differ- 
ent in character point back with such wonder- 
ful concurrence, continue in the new form ? 
Contrary as this is to all historical criticism, 
there is in the contents of the work, in the singu- 
lar manner in which isolated and independent 



TEE ACTS OF PILATE. 149 

details 123 are shown to be related to the ca- 
nonical bcfoks, no less than in the accordance 
with the earliest quotations found in Justin 
and Tertullian, 124 a guaranty of the greatest 
antiquity. There are in the contents, also, 
matters of such a nature that we must confess 
that they are to be traced back to the primitive 
edition ; as, for example, the narrative in the first 
chapter of the bringing forward of the accused. 
But the whole character of the work in our pos- 
session does not deny in toto that which we 
must infer from the statements of Justin and 
Tertullian. It is incorrect, moreover, to draw 
a conclusion from Justin's designation of the 
Acta which is not warranted by the whole char- 
acter of the work. The Acta, the wtoimjiuxza, 
are specified in Justin's account, not less than 
in the manuscripts which we possess, as being 
written under Pontius Pilate ; and that can sig- 
nify nothing else than that they were an official 
production, composed under the direct sanc- 
tion of the Roman Governor. Their transmis- 
sion to the Emperor must be imagined as accom- 
panied by a letter of the same character with 



150 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

that which has been brought down to us in the 
Greek and Latin edition, 125 and yet* not at all 
similar in purport to the notable Acts of Pilate. 
It is by no means necessary for us to assert 
that the production in our hands has (with the 
exception of the preface already alluded to) re- 
mained free from interpolations ; for the dis- 
tinguishing characteristic which it* bears is the 
weaving in of much from the synoptic Gospels, 
and still more from John, relative to the last 
sufferings of Jesus. 126 Is it not % stated in Jus- 
tin that the Acts of Pilate reveal the fulfillment 
of the prophecy respecting the resurrection from 
the dead, as it is given in chapter eight of 
the work in our hands, in the testimony con- 
cerning the raising of Lazarus ? Is it probable 
that, in order to set John aside, we are to be- 
lieve that in Justin's edition there was recorded 
one of the two other resurrections, of which we 
have traces preserved for us ? 

It would lead us to the denial of an unques- 
tionable fact should we not admit the claims of 
our Acts of Pilate, in their connection with the 
work of the same name known to Justin, to 



GOSPEL OF THE IXFAXCT. 151 

serve as testimony to the authority of the Jo- 
hanneaii as well as the synoptic Gospels, dating 
from a period prior to Justin, in spite of their 
frequent use of those Gospels. TThat impor- 
tance this fact has in enabling us to determine 
the age of our Gospels, and especially that of 
John, is at once apparent ; it wSighs far more 
than any verbal extracts made from John in 
the epoch of Justin. If the apocryphal Acts of 
Pilate must, for the reason that Justin cites 
them in" his first Apology to the Roman Enrpe- 
ror, be ascribed to the first decades of the second 
century, they show, by their use of and depend- 
ence upon the Gospel of John, that the latter 
dates from a period even earlier. This theory 
throws no light into the impenetrable darkness, 
but, among the many beams which come down 
from the period directly after the age of the 
apostles, and which illumine the most impor- 
tant question of Christianity, this is one of the 
most luminous. 

VTe might also cite Thomas's Gospel of the 
Infancy for our purpose. Irenams and Hippo- 
lytus m both show that it was used by the Mar- 



152 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

cosians and the Naasenians ; it was therefore un- 
questionably one of the first results of the pro- 
ductive heresy of that age, and must be ascribed 
to the middle of the second century. Its text 
we possess only in fragments, which are at 
issue 128 often among themselves, and which 
consequently makes it difficult to ascertain the 
connection of scattered passages with those of 
the Gospels. The work seems, however, to bear 
witness in one respect to the results of my re- 
searches, and not in the not unimportant fact 
that at the time when this book appeared, in 
the middle of the second century, the Gospel 
canon ordinarily accepted was already formed, 
and the story of the years of Jesus' childhood 
filled up a break in the account of his life. 
This left a district open to historical research, 
and one which heresy knew well how to prize. 
Besides this there confronts us one fact more, 
which admits of application to the three more or 
less perfectly personal evidences of the Chris- 
tian Apocraphy. The wide divergence found in 
these, in respect to form as well as substance, to 
language as well as spirit, to delineation as well 



PSEUDO-CLEMEXTIXE LITERATURE. 153 

as conception, bears witness to a sacred origin 
of our canonical Gospels, to which the apocry- 
phal writings are related as the last subjoined 
appendices. 

I might allude here in a single word to the 
pseudo-Clementine literature, whose main work, 
the Homilies, is certainly to be ascribed to the 
middle of the second century. The establish- 
ment of this date does not lead to the necessity 
of drawing any such inferences respecting the 
history of the canon as we drew in the case of 
the book of James and the Acts of Pilate. 
Still it is very instructive that the transition of 
the Gospel of John into this Judaic-Christian- 
tendency record. 129 which was not at all dis- 
puted till the year 1853. has been shown to be 
utterly untenable by the discovery by Dressel. at 
Rome, of the concluding portions of it where 
(xix. 22) John's narrative of the man who was 
born blind is made use of beyond all doubt. 

The elucidation already given respecting the 
Acts of Pilate and the book of James had already 
brought us to the opening first decades of the 
second century, and compelled us to confer 



154 OBIGffl OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

that there was unquestionably use made, at 
that period, of our Gospels. No one of the re- 
maining results of our investigations into the 
ecclesiastical and heretical literature of the 
second century stood in antagonism with this 
fact. Not only the apocryphal writings already 
named bring us back to that epoch, but a work 
of great repute in the Christian literature, one 
which from even the close of the second cen- 
tury to the opening of the fourth was assigned 
by such men as Clemens Alexandrinus 130 to 
Holy Writ. It forms a part of the so-called 
apostolical Fathers, regarding which we have 
already spoken in our discussion of the epistles 
of Ignatius and that of Poly carp. If it really 
bore rightly the name of Barnabas, the com- 
panion of Paul, it would, in spite of certain un- 
satisfactory details, be correctly entitled to a 
place among the sacred books of the New Tes- 
tament. Slight as is the ecclesiastical or scien- 
tific recognition granted to this claim of author- 
ship, yet the assertion is made with confidence, 
that the epistle bearing the name of Barnabas 
is one of the earliest written records which have 






EPISTLE OF BARNABAS. 155 

come down to us from the epoch directly sub- 
sequent to the life of the apostles. If the ex- 
pressions (in the sixteenth chapter) conjoined 
with the word of prophecy regarding the re- 
building of the City and the Temple are in ac- 
cordance with historical fact, we are brought 
back from the conflicting statements respecting 
the closing decades of the first century and the 
opening decades of the second, to the first year 
of Hadrian's reign. In its aim and general 
character the epistle bears the closest resem- 
blance, among the books of the New Testament, 
to the Epistle to the Hebrews ; it is directed 
against such Christian converts from Judaism, 
who, while accepting the new covenant, sought 
to cling to the old, and hence felt that they 
must share with the former fellow-believers in 
the grief over the 'fall of the Jewish Temple. 
In opposition to them, the epistle, basing itself 
largely upon Old Testament prophecy and au- 
thority, arrays the proof that the new covenant 
brought in by Christ had completely done away 
with the older one, and that the latter had 
merely been, with its temple and whole service, 



156 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

an incomplete and temporary type of the new 
covenant. 

Within the last two centuries scholars have 
busied themselves much with this document, 
but unfortunately there are lacking in all the 
Greek manuscripts of it, the first five chapters ; 
only an old Latin translation, gfeatly incom- 
plete, 131 supplies the deficiency. And exactly 
in those chapters which are found only in the 
Latin copy is there a passage which has excited 
great curiosity. " Let us be on our guard," 
thus it reads in the fourth chapter, " that we 
be not be found to be, as it is written, many 
called btft few chosen." " Adtendamus ergo 
ne forte, sicut scriptum est, multi vocati, pauci 
electi inveniamur." The expression, " as it is 
written," will be readily recognized by the reader 
as a familiar one in the New Testament. It is 
the phrase which always designates the differ- 
ence between all passages of Holy Writ and all 
others, and was invariably used by the apostles, 
as well as by the Saviour, in citing the Old 
Testament. If it were ever applied to a pas- 
sage outside of the canon, it only followed that 



EPISTLE OF BARNABAS. 157 

the passage in question had been drawn by fre- 
quent use into the circle of canonical writings, 
just as. for example, Jucle cites from the 
prophet Enoch. It could be publicly trans- 
ferred to the writings of the apostles, when the 
latter were placed on the same basis with the 
Old Testament. As soon as passages of the 
Gospels were cited in connection with the 
phrase. " as it is written. " ? it was assumed that 
they had become canonical. TTe had occasion 
on a former page to allude to this matter, while 
referring to Justin's arranging the Gospels and 
the Prophecies side by side, and to the epistles 
of Ignatius ; the same formula was also encoun- 
tered in the Xew Testament quotations of the 
Naasenians. The words which have been cited 
in the Epistle of Barnabas in connection with 
the same formula are in the Gospel of Matthew, 
xxii. li. and xx. 16. If our inference is cor- 
rect, at the time when the Epistle of Barnabas 
was written, this Gospel was regarded as canon- 
ical. 

But the Epistle of Barnabas extends back to 
the highest Christian antiquity. And is it pos- 




158 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

sible, some ask, that at so remote a period the 
passage from Matthew should be marked by 
the characteristics of canonization ? The doubt 
conveyed in this question has been materially 
strengthened by the circumstance that the pas- 
sage has hitherto existed only in a Latin form. 
It was possible to say, therefore, that this sig- 
nificant phrase was added by a translator liv- 
ing long subsequently. Dr. Credner, in 1832, 
wrote these literal words : " The form of cita- 
tion, sicut Scriptum est, applied to a book of 
the New Testament, was wholly without usage 
im that time, and not an instance of it can be 
found." The portion of the Epistle of Barna- 
bas which contains the passage under discus- 
sion does not exist at present in the original 
Greek, but only in a Latin translation. It was 
an easy matter, therefore, for the translator to 
subjoin the current formula of quotation ; and 
from internal evidence we must accordingly 
lay claim to the correctness of the text in the 
passage under consideration, till some one shall 
show satisfactory proof to the contrary. In 
order to decide the question respecting the an- 



EPISJLE OF BAEXABAS. 159 

tiquity of the formula, it was necessary to con- 
sult the original Greek text. It was destined 
not to be withheld from the Christian world. 
After lying many hundreds of years among the 
old parchments at the Convent of St. Catherine 
in the wilderness of Sinai, it came to light in a 
happy hour ; for with the Sinaitic Bible, the 
whole of the Epistle of Barnabas was discovered 
in the original Greek. And what is the de- 
cision which it gives respecting the subject un- 
der discussion ? It decides that the writer of 
the epistle himself placed the important Chris- 
tian-classic expression, u as it is written," before 
the quotation from Matthew, and that it was 
not the work of the translator. 

After this important fact was established, a 
new question arose, namely, whether important 
inferences could be drawn unconditionally from 
this phrase. Could not the formula, " as it is 
written," be accepted as referring to any book ? 
How little ground there is for this I have al- 
ready shown in my explanations of the use to 
be made of this formula ; and we have no right 
to weaken its force in the present instance. 



160 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

But are we also compelled to recognize its rela- 
tion to the passage from Matthew ? What 
would be more evident, if we are to escape the 
assaults of unsound and partisan criticism ? 
A writer of this class has brought forward a 
notion which once brought down the scorn of 
Credner 132 upon it, namely, that the quotation 
of Barnabas's Epistle is to be referred to the 
fourth book of Ezra, quoted elsewhere in the 
Epistle. 133 There, in the eighth chapter, it is 
expressly stated according to the Latin and 
Ethiopian text, " nam multi creati sunt (in the 
Ethiop., besides, in eo,i. e. mundo) pauci autem 
salvabuntur,"— for many have been born, but 
few shall be saved. In spite of the applause 
which this 134 has received in a certain quarter, it 
only shows to what wanton fancies the opposition 
brought against the age of our -evangelical canon 
leads men. The visible absurdity of referring 
a citation, taken word for word from Matthew, 
to a passage in a book of Ezra, written twenty 
years earlier 135 and having quite a different 
meaning, is carried so far that the expression 
of the Saviour in Matthew is degraded into a 



EPISTLE OF BARS ABAS. 161 

mere " Christian interpretation " of the passage 
in Ezra. 138 That Matthew is referred to else- 
where in the Epistle is supposed not to have its 
weight in strengthening the citation from him 
accompanied by the canonical formula, but to 
prove, on the contrary, that Barnabas, with all 
his acquaintance with Matthew, did not hold 
his work to be a sacred book. 137 It is forgotten 
that quite often we meet in the later Fathers, 
in connection with direct and express quota- 
tions, the same weaving in of a biblical clause 
that we have in Barnabas ; and in these cases 
the reader is pre-supposed to have that familiar- 
ity with Scripture which will enable him to deter- 
mine what it is which is thus woven in, with- 
out its being definitely pointed out with words 
or signs of quotation. Thus, for example, in 
chapter five of Barnabas's Epistle, we have the 
expression, " He chose for his disciples, to go 
forth and announce his gospel, men full of sin 
and unrighteousness, in order to show that he 
had not come to call the righteous, but sinners ; 
and therefore he revealed himself as the Son of 

God." What reader of these words could fail 
11 



162 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

to see in them the rejection of what our Sav- 
viour says in Matt. ix. 13, " I am not come to call 
the righteous, but sinners to repentance " ? 138 
We have, moreover, in the twelfth chapter, 
" Since it is a thing in the future 139 that men 
shall say that Christ is David's son, therefore 
David himself, comprehending in advance the 
error which sinners will make, says, ' The 
Lord says unto my Lord, sit thou here on my 
right hand until I make thine enemies thy foot- 
stool.' " Could Barnabas write this without pre- 
supposing that his readers would have Matt. 
xxii.,41, et sq. in mind? And in this presup- 
position is not the recognition of the authority 
of the then extant Gospel of Matthew taken for 
granted ? And if in the same twelfth chapter 
of Matthew it is shown how Moses lifted up the 
brazen serpent in the wilderness in typification 
of the Saviour, " who should suffer (die) and 
yet himself give life to others," it is directly 
obvious that Barnabas was making use of the 
truth hinted at in John iii. 14, even if the 
phrase, taken word by word, fails to show this. 
It is possible indeed that the writer of this 



EPISTLE OF BARNABAS. 163 

Epistle wrote independently in this case, as in 
many others; and yet we are justified in assum- 
ing the very great probability that he had the 
passage of John in mind: still, in assuming , 
this, it by no means follows that his Epistle is 
written in the same tone as that of John's, and 
was a reflex of it. The disproportionate num- 
ber of express quotations from the Old Testa- 
ment found in Barnabas is in direct relation 
with the whole character of his Epistle : and no 
inference can be drawn from it, which invali- 
dates the canonization 140 of the Gospels. 

Does, then, the fact indicated by the Epistle 
of Barnabas, that the Gospel of Matthew was 
reckoned a part of Holy Writ prior to the year 
120, come into hazardous conflict with the re- 
suits already gained by us in our study of the 
second century ? It is needless to try to an- 
swer such a question. There is only down- 
right gain to our side, and that of a new and 
important link in the chain of proofs support- 
ing the very earliest acceptance of the credibil- 
ity of the Gospels; a new barrier erected against 
the idle vagaries of conjecture which have hith- . 



164 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

erto been allowed to float around and hide the 
history of the New Testament canon. 

But are we compelled to limit to Matthew 
the authenticity thus granted to his canonical 
value ? By no means. All our studies re- 
specting the history of the canon lead to this 
result, that the attempt was not made in the 
infancy of the church to raise any one of the 
Gospels, taken exclusively, to the rank of ca- 
nonical writings. For we saw, in the first half 
of the second century, now Matthew, now John, 
now Luke, or one taken in connection with an- 
other, come into the foreground ; and this 
shows conclusively that at that epoch no one 
was credited while another was discredited. 
The small compass, too, of the literature 
which has come down to us from that time, 
and the character of the Gospels, taken sep- 
arately, — Matthew, for example, being incom- 
parably better adapted for quotation than Mark, 
— lead to the inference that the one bears wit- 
ness to the equal, worth of the other. And we 
learned, too, from Justin's use of the Acts of 
Pilate about the year 140, that the Gospel of 



EQUAL VALUE OF THE GOSPELS. 165 

John, so much used, not only in those Acts 
which were written some few decades before 
Justin's Apology, but also in connection with 
the synoptic Gospels, must be assigned to the 
opening of the second century, Justin himself 
having often made use of John, and still more 
frequently of Matthew. Is not this alone sat- 
isfactory proof that if, at the time* when the 
Epistle of Barnabas was written, Matthew had 
attained to canonical authority, John too must 
have had the same ? Basilides used John and 
Luke at the time of Hadrian ; Valentin, about 
140, John, Matthew, and Luke ; and are there 
not safe inferences to be drawn thence that 
these writers are in close alliance ? 

To this must be added the fact that we so 
early and so repeatedly find, as, for example, iii 
Justin and Agrippa Castor, the separate Gos- 
pels united in one whole, and that, in view of 
the collective and grand character thus given to 
this whole, the name and individuality of each 
writer are thrown into the background, but 
that, on the other hand, Justin refers occasion- 
ally to the discrimination made, at a later day, 



166 OlilGUSf OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

by Tertullian, in the 'character of the four Evan- 
gelists, according to which some were the real 
disciples of the Lord, and the others apostolical 
companions. And how are we to understand 
otherwise that soon after the middle of the sec- 
ond century Harmonies of the Four Gospels 
were prepared, and that in Irenasus — not to 
lose sight *of him — the four are unitedly sub- 
jected to comment, without the least hint of 
there being superior or inferior value on the part 
of the separate Gospels? Is there the faintest 
indication that, in the course of the second cen- 
tury, the church, while discussing many issues 
which are reported to us, took up and passed its 
judgment upon the Gospel canon, — a funda- 
mental matter ; while, before the close of that 
century, the same canon meets us everywhere 
as having been long accepted ? 

But when, then, are we to consider that the 
canon passed into general acceptance ? Every- 
thing compels us to assign it to the close of the 
first century, or to the opening years of the 
second. That was the time when, with the 
death of the aged 141 John, all the revered men 



THE CANON, WHEN ACCEPTED. 167 

who had stood in personal relations with Jesus, 
and Paul too, the great apostle to the Gentiles, 
" had passed away, and could no longer give their 
direct authority in all ecclesiastical matters to 
the young church ; the time when the church 
was outgrowing its old home, and stretching 
wider and wider out, convulsed within by vari- 
ous movements, and pressed upon without by 
hostile assaults, — then it was that men began 
to consecrate and regard with hallowing ven- 
eration the writings which the founders of the 
church had left behind them, gather them up 
as imperishable bequests, as well-authenticated 
evidences of the life and teachings of the Sav- 
iour, the most precious types of what men's 
faith and practice should be. The fit time had 
evidently come to put these writings on the 
same basis as that of the old covenant. The 
complete separation of the church from the 
synagogue had taken place : subsequently to 
the destruction of Jerusalem and of its temple 
(about the year 70), the church had been 
thrown more decidedly upon itself, and had 
become more independent ; and it was a signifi- 



168 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

cant sign of this independence to ascribe to the 
writings which recorded the life of the Saviour 
and the deeds of his followers the same sanctity 
which had long invested the sacred documents 
of the synagogue , on which Christianity was 
based. 

Do we ask in what way this has taken place? 
It certainly is not a question which needs much 
time to enable us to answer it. If men like 
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John left on record 
statements respecting the life of our Lord, who 
would not have recognized them at once as a 
precious bequest to the church, and gratefully 
accepted them ? Did it require more than 
their honored names to insure for their writ- 
ings the greatest veneration by the whole 
church ? And had not these men all stood in 
close enough personal relations with the church 
to insure the latter against receiving any works 
which should be unauthentic, and palmed off 
by trickery ? And of no Gospel is this more 
true than of John's. Suppose that it did pro- 
ceed from the midst of his Asia Minor congre- 
gations, and pass into the possession of wider 



JOHN' 8 GOSPEL. 109 

circles : could the least suspicion of a want of 
genuineness fasten to it ? But in case it did not 
proceed from his own congregations, would the 
latter not have detected the imposition at once? 
It was impossible to bring them to accept an 
unauthentic word of their own bishop : certainly 
not by deception. But we have the bishop 
who followed John at Ephesus as one of the 
witnesses to the authenticity of his Gospel. 
For if Polycrates. bishop of Ephesus in the last 
quarter of the second century, in a letter ad- 
dressed to Victor of Rome (Eus. Hist. Eccl. v. 
24). alludes to the apostle buried in Ephesus, 
and characterized him with the same expres- 
sion which is used in John xiii. 23 and 25 3 — 
- who leaned on the Lord's bosom." — there is 
beyond all doubt a confirmation of the Gospel. 
As to the rest, that John was the last who 
wrote is evidenced not only by the very an- 
cient tradition that he was the one whose 
name was always mentioned after the others, 
as we have seen to be the case in the hints 
drawn from Muratori, in Irenaras. and in the 
oldest Greek manuscripts. 142 but Clemens Alex- 



170 ORIGIN OF THE' FOUR GOSPELS. 

andriims and Eusebius give distinct expres- 
sion to it in what they have communicated 
to us respecting the circumstances which gave 
rise to that Gospel. In the first of these latter 
writers (see Ens. vi. 14), the wish of friends is 
represented as prompting the more spiritual- 
minded disciple to add a fourth Gospel to the 
other three, for the purpose of recording more 
distinctly the workings of Jesus' spirit. Ac- 
cording to the latter (iii. 24), while confessing 
the truth and authentic value of the first three 
Gospels, he is represented as omitting what 
relates more exclusively to the public activity 
of Jesus, and giving a needful compliment to 
the evangelical narrative. 

Since, then, the writings left behind by the 
apostles stand at the very outset in the per- 
sonal authority of the writers, this authority of 
course only grew in magnitude after the de- 
cease of the persons who have personally been 
the representatives of the spirit of the Gospel. 
Out of the vital development of the church 
grew the primitive canon of the New Testament, 
and took its place side by side with the Old. 



GROWTH OF THE CAXOX. 171 

It would bo easy to admit that such a canon, in 
accordance with its evangelical character (not 
to speak here of its other features), would natu- 
rally fall within the time which has been as- 
signed, viz., the close of the first century: 
this, however, we should not be able to settle 
definitely 143 unless the history and literature of 
the whole second proved such a cogent argu- 
ment in its favor. 

There is yet one thing more to add to what 
has already been said respecting the Oldest 
Christian literature. It is the evidence which 
Papias gives, and which, more than any other, 
has been misused by the opponents of our Gos- 
pels. The want of positive knowledge which 
rests upon this man, as well as upon his testi- 
mony, makes him not a fit subject to be taken 
either independently or in antagonism with 
other witnesses. 

From Eusebius (iii. 39) we learn, confirmed 
as it is by Irenasus (v. 38: 4), that Papias 
composed a work in five books, which he called 
an Exposition of the sayings of our Lord. 144 
While he was collecting the materials for this 



172 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

work he believed that his task was not- so 
much to cull what was to be found in written 
records as in unwritten tradition ; and, accord- 
ing to his own assurance, he drew especially 
from those oral accounts which could be traced 
back to the apostles. These are his own words 
regarding his book : " I shall arrange with as- 
siduity whatever I may gather from the presby- 
ters (elders), and retain in memory, while 
aiming to ascertain the truth of the same by 
meails of personal investigation. For I did 
not find my pleasure, as most do, in those who 
have much to tell, but in those who teach the 
truth ; not in those who bring forward what is 
strange, and out of the usual course (rag alio- 
TQiag ivrolag), but in those who surrender" them- 
selves absolutely to the truth, 145 and claim line- 
age with what is true. Whenever, therefore, I 
fell in with those who used to be on intimate 
terms with the presbyters, I made special in- 
quiries as to what Andrew, or Peter, or Philip, 
or Thomas, or James, or John, or Matthew, or 
any other disciple of the Lord, or as to what Aris- 
tion and John the presbyter, disciples also, have 



PAPIAS '5 TESTIMONY. 173 

to say. 146 For I believed that the books (ra h 
zgjv p(3/dcor) would not be of so much service to 
me in giving exhaustive information as the liv- 
ing word of men (quantum ex hominum adlmc 
superstitum voce).' 5 

This passage of Papias is obscure in various 
ways, and on this account I have endeavored 
to translate it literally. The first and most 
important point to settle is, who the elders or 
" presbyters " were. Papias alludes to them 
as his vouchers, whom he used in part directly, 
in part indirectly. Are the apostles themselves 
to be regarded as covered by the expression ? 
It is supposed by many that they are ; but this 
notion is absolutely denied and rendered unten- 
able by Eusebius. For, after stating that Ire- 
naeus designates Papias as a " hearer of John 
and companion of Polycarp,'' he qualifies his 
words by saying, i4 But Papias has by no means 
represented him in the preface of his book as 
one who himself heard and saw the holy apos- 
tles : he teaches, on the contrary, that he had re- 
ceived the matters of faith (ru zrjg m<ns&g) from 
those who had had personal acquaintance with 




174 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

them Qtaga x&v txeivotg yvcoqiiicov) . In like man- 
ner, he says, a little farther on in the same 
chapter (iii. 89: 4), Papias insists that he re- 
ceived the words of the apostles from their own 
followers, and says that he himself drew from 
the lips 147 of Aristion and the presbyter John ; 
adding this, that Papias often mentions these 
by name when giving in his book the commu- 
nications which they made. It is not only in- 
credible that Eusebius erred in this, it was, in- 
deed, scarcely possible for him to do so. For, 
as he had the whole work of Papias before him, 
and was- making selections for his own pur- 
poses, it could scarcely escape him, if Papias, 
in one case or another, appealed # to the direct 
communication of an apostle, clear as it was to 
him that he had known Aristion and the pres- 
byter John. And how wholly differently would 
he have brought forward in his preface his 
vouchers, had they been the apostles ! he surely 
would not have written, as he has, words which 
are capable of a double interpretation, if he had 
been reterring directly to them. In the whole 
passage, however, the presbyters are set. in con- 



TERM "PRESBYTERS." 17 O 

trast with the apostles ; and yet the clause, 
"the disciples of the Lord," subjoined to the 
names Aristion and John the presbyter, makes 
the meaning of this expression obscure ; at 
least rendering a double interpretation of it 
possible. And is it -credible that Papias should 
say that he would confirm with his own declara- 
tions the statement of the apostles ? Respect- 
ing the words of the presbyters, he could say 
this with the more justice, because, as his own 
words and the declaration of Eusebius show, 
he was able to use of these only Aristion and 
John ; but in the case of the others, he had to 
rely on what was communicated indirectly. 
Irenaeus brings evidence confirmatory of this 
way of interpreting the term " presbyters ; " 
for he derives the tradition of the " wanton 
luxury of the kingdom of a thousand years " 
expressly from the mouth of " the presbyters 
who had seen John, the disciple of the Lord," 
and confirms this by appealing directly to the 
writings of Papias. Granting in this way that 
he was a hearer of John and a friend of Poly- 
carp, it is perfectly clear that the presbyters in 



176 ORIGW OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

Irenaeus have the same signification as in Pa- 
pias, and that they are not for an instant to be 
confounded with the apostles. 148 This infer- 
ence respecting Papias which is found in Ire- 
naeus rests in -the greatest probability on no 
other ground than the statetoent of Papias him- 
self, carefully drawn up by Eusebius, but care- 
lessly used by Irenaeus ; but that he confounded 
the apostle John, as his manner of speaking 
would indicate, is consistent with the fact that, 
as can be shown, the personality of the presby- 
ter John, who likewise lived and died at Ephe- 
sus, w^as forgotten at a very early day. 149 We 
ought not to overlook the chronological diffi- 
culty connected with the supposition that Pa- 
pias, who, according to the oldest testimony, 
suffered martyrdom about the same time as 
Polycarp, i. e. 165, was not able to collect the 
materials for his work among surviving apos- 
tles (rtaQo, t(av TtQeafivtsQwv) . How little the con- 
tents, so far as we know them, correspond to 
what we should expect from a work written by 
a disciple of the apostles, who is recording 



THE WORK OF PAP IAS. Ill 

what he learned from their own lips, may be 
judged from what we will proceed to give. 

Eusebius cites explicitly from the contents 
of that work of Papias, that the daughters of 
Philip informed him at Hierapolis of the resur- 
rection of a dead man immediately subsequently 
to their father's time, and that Justus Barsab- 
bas had drunken a goblet of poison without ex- 
periencing any injury. (Both of these accounts 
might be brought into relation with expressions 
of our Lord, as in fulfillment of them.) In 
addition, Papias asserted (we give the accounts 
in Eusebius iii. 39 : 5 literally) that he had 
learned many things through oral tradition, as 
well as some unknown Qdvag, strange) parables 
and teachings of the Lord, and other things, 
which were all too fabulous" QwdixwreQCi) . To 
this class Eusebius assigns the doctrine of a 
kingdom of a thousand years' duration, which 
was to appear sensible on the earth after the 
resurrection of the dead. The representation 
of this kingdom was not given by Eusebius, but 
by Irenasus. It runs as follows : " Then shall 
come the days in which vinestocks shall appear, 
12 



178 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

each one putting forth ten thousand branches, 
each branch ten thousand shoots, each shoot 
ten thousand clusters of grapes, and each clus- 
ter twenty-five measures of wine ; and if one 
of the saints should try to take hold of one of 
the clusters, another of the latter will cry, I 
am better ; lay hold of me, and praise the Lord 
by me. In like manner, an ear of corn will 
bring forth ten thousand ears, and each ear ten 
thousand grains," etc. This representation is 
made by Papias, as Irenseus testifies, to refer 
to the " elders," and, through them, even to 
John. Eusebius remarks, in reference to it, 
that Papias, a man of very inconsiderable men- 
tal parts, as his whole book shows, gathered his 
notions from misapprehended expressions of 
the apostles. He then goes on to say that there 
are other sayings of the Lord, dating from Aris- 
tion and John the presbyter, recorded in the 
book of Papias ; but he refers those who may be 
interested in them to the work itself. To this 
he adds that he will subjoin to what has been 
already cited what he has learned respecting 
Mark. This runs, " And this says the presby- 



PAPIAS'S WORK. 179 

ter : " Mark, the interpreter of Peter, wrote care- 
fully down all that he recollected, but not ac- 
cording to (tahi) the order of Christ's speak- 
ing or working ; for he neither heard Christ, 
nor was a direct follower of him, but of Peter, 
as already intimated, who always held his dis- 
courses as circumstances made it expedient, 
but do not seek to arrange the sayings of the 
Lord in any regular order. Mark accomplished 
all that he purposed in writing what he had to 
record just as he remembered it. There was 
one thing, however, which he did keep in mind ; 
that was, not to omit anything that he had 
heard, or to falsify anything which he under- 
took to set down." To this statement of Pa- 
pias, which, judging by its tone, possibly only 
refers in its first part to the presbyter, Euse- 
bius subjoins a second statement respecting 
Matthew, as follows : " This is what Papias 
records respecting Mark ; but of Matthew he 
savs, ' Matthew recorded in the Hebrew Ian- 
guage the sayings of the Lord, but he trans- 
lated every one of them as best he could." In 
these words much is obscure : especially doubt- 



180 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

ful is it whether we have rightfully translated 
"sayings of the Lord;" 150 at least *the casual 
words of Mark, " what Christ spoke and did," 
would seem to make it probable that both acts 
and words were comprehended under the single 
word " sayings." But do these expressions of 
the presbyter and of Papias — and this is the 
main question — relate to the two Gospels in 
our possession bearing the names of Matthew 
and Mark ? And if the expression, " sayings 
of the Lord," is to remain unmolested, it does 
not follow that a historical clothing of these 
sayings is to be excluded, since neither Euse- 
bius nor any other theologian of Christian anti- 
quity supposed that the words of Papias stood 
in antagonism with the two Gospels. If in our 
time the inference has been drawn from the 
words of Papias, that our Gospel according to 
Mark is to be regarded only in a secondary 
sense as the work of Mark, and is to be re- 
garded as a subsequent revision of a work once 
written by Mark, but which was lost sight of 
at a very early date, the idea would show itself 
to be a manifest freak of fancy. It would have 



PAPIAS' S TESTIMONY. 181 

no other mission than to open to the freest play 
of conjecture all our investigations respecting 
the origin and the mutual relations of our three 
synoptical Gospels. 

True as this is of Mark, it is no less true of 
Matthew. The statement of Papias has its 
point in this, that it ascribes only a Hebrew 
text to Matthew even. If this statement have 
a satisfactory basis, even if we accept the other, 
viz.. that every one translated it as well as he 
could, it leaves a broad margin between the 
primitive Hebrew and our Greek Matthew. 
That Hebrew text, like the primitive Mark, 
must have been lost at a very early date, as not 
a single one of the church Fathers saw or used 
it. This gives rise to one of the most intricate 
of questions, the discussion of which, however, 
would not be in place here. We 3 on our side, 
are fully satisfied in the matter, being convinced 
that the acceptance by Papias of a primitive He- 
brew text of Matthew (a view which may not 
have been limited to him, and may have been 
repeated by others) rested entirely upon a mis- 
understanding. I will briefly indicate of what 



182 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

character it was, and whence it arose. The 
Judo-Christian struggles which sprung into 
being during the lifetime of the apostle Paul 
come more and more markedly into the fore- 
ground. There were two parties specially 
prominent : that of the Nazarseans was more 
moderate than the one more closely allied to 
philosophical speculation, the Ebionites. Both 
made use of a Gospel which bore the name of 
Matthew, the former in the Hebrew language, 
the latter in the Greek, the same document to 
which reference was made on a preceding page 
as the Gospel of the Hebrews. That they did 
not hesitate to make modifications according to 
their own taste, in the text as they originally 
received it, is clear from the standpoint which 
they occupied, that of being- the only sect char- 
acterized by strong self-will. And what we have 
really learned of this Gospel shows, as already 
stated, not only the great similarity to our Mat- 
thew, but also arbitrary deviations which have 
been made from him in some instances. When 
it was said later — I mean in the course of the 
second century — that the Nazaraeans, a race 



JEROME. 183 

dating from the very emergence of Christianity, 
possessed Matthew in the Hebrew, what was 
more natural than for one and another to as- 
sume, wholly in accordance with the claims of 
the Judo-Christian heretics, that Matthew him- 
self wrote in Hebrew, and that the Greek text, 
the one which was circulated not only in the 
church, but among other Judo-Christians, was 
a translation ? No one knew, no one made in- 
quiries how divergent the two versions were ; 
and not only were such investigations foreign 
to the character of the times, but the exclu- 
siveness of the Nazarseans especially drew them 
away from such researches, making their home, 
as they did, apart, in the neighborhood of the 
Dead Sea. 

Jerome gives us the benefit of his support 
in this explanation of the statement of Papias. 
Jerome, who was especially skilled in Hebrew, 
gained the temporary use of a Hebrew Gospel 
of the Nazarseans,'and at once proclaimed that 
that was the primitive text of Matthew. Going- 
deeper into the matter, however, he simply said 
that many held this Hebrew text to be the 



184 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

original from Matthew's own hand ; he trans- 
lated it, moreover, into Greek and Latin, and 
made some comments upon it. From these, as 
well as from some fragments preserved by the 
Fathers of the church, it may be shown that the 
view represented by many scholars of late, and 
in a certain sense shared with Papias, that the 
so-called Hebrew Gospel is older than Matthew, 
must be received in its very opposite form.; 
that that Hebrew book is a perversion of our 
Greek Matthew, whose record bears the marks 
in the whole of its diction, and especially in the 
form of its Old Testament quotations, of being 
no translation, but an original. That same in- 
dependence of our Matthew is to be marked in 
the Greek version of the Hebrew Gospel cur- 
rent among the Ebionites, only with this dis- 
tinction, that here the heretical character may, 
in consequence of the various hands which exe- 
cuted it, have assumed a more decided character. 
Being in Greek, it was better known in the 
church than the Hebrew version ; and in the very 
earliest epoch it was held to be another text of 
Matthew. This agrees with what Papias wrote 



PAP IAS AND HIS WORK. 185 

respecting the various versions of Matthew, 
among which he reckoned the Greek Matthew 
then held by the church. 

There is still more to be said of Papias and 
his work. In relation to his efforts to obtain 
materials he wrote that he believed that less 
was needed in consequence of what was already 
written in books. To what books did he refer ? 
May it not have been our own Gospels ? The 
expression used would make this not impos- 
sible, but the whole character of the book would 
render it in the highest degree improbable ; for 
he made no secret of his object of preparing, on 
the ground of what was then, about a. d. 130 or 
140, 151 related regarding the Saviour, a kind of 
supplement to the Gospels, and he may or may 
not have directed special reference to the pro- 
phetical allusions to the Lord. The Gospels, 
therefore, he could not have used as sources, 
and as affording materials for his collections. 
The books referred to by him must ■ be under- 
stood as rather relating to unauthentic and 
more or less apocryphal records of the Lord's 
career, of which there were so manv from the 



186 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

earliest date. These he set over against the 
oral communications which he had received, 
whose authenticity, as it could be traced 
through the elders back to the apostles them- 
selves, like the evangelical writings, seemed to 
be unquestionable. 

From that part of Papias's work which Euse- 
bius thought was worth preserving, I have al- 
ready cited the story of the resurrection from 
the dead which the daughters of Philip asserted 
that they had heard of their father, and also 
the account of Justus Barsabbas and the poison. 
In a third passage, where the Gospel of the 
Hebrews gives its corroborative evidence, he re- 
peats the story of a woman who had been ac- 
cused before Jesus of sin. In like manner it 
was stated in his book, as we learn of Catenen 
and (Ekumenius, that Judas the betrayer was 
of such monstrous corpulence that he was 
crushed by a carriage in a narrow street, and 
that his bowels gushed out in consequence. 
Regarding the further contents of the book, 
Eusebius informs us, as already remarked, 
that, in addition to a few matters altogether 



PAPIAS AND HIS WORK. 187 

fabulous, it contained a few parables and say- 
ings of our Lord, hitherto unknown but utterly 
unworthy of being recorded; and no ecclesiasti- 
cal writer has done so, excepting in the case of 
Irenaeus's strange account of the kingdom which 
should last a thousand years. In addition to 
this, Anastasius Sinaita has called attention to 
the fact that Papias has made the days of crea- 
tion and paradise refer to Christ and the 
church ; and Andrew the Oappadocian, in his 
Commentary on the Apocalypse, quoted a re- 
mark of Papias respecting the angels who had 
been unfaithful to their trust in the govern- 
ment of the world. The latter writer, as does 
Arethas also, cites the authority of Papias in 
support of the credibility (Arethas uses the word 
" inspiration ") of the Apocalypse. 152 

In view of all that has been said above, is 
Papias's book one which can be accepted as 
throwing important light upon the history of 
our Gospels ? The judgment of Eusebius re- 
specting the man, that he was of limited under- 
standing, is justified not only by the details 
which are brought into view, but confirmed by 



188 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the fact that his alleged contributions to our 
evangelical literature have been utterly disre- 
garded by the church. What would not a sin- 
gle parable of the Lord be worth if its authen- 
ticity could be substantiated ! But no one has 
taken the slightest notice of all that has been 
recorded by Papias ; the fabulous character* 
which Eusebius charges upon the book — -a man 
himself characterized by extreme critical acu- 
men — has adhered to the whole work, and it is 
very unfair to trace this charge to a preposses- 
sion in favor of the Chiliasts. The question 
which has been raised we must answer in the 
negative, in view not only of the character of 
the man but also of the tendency of his book, 
although the passage referring to Matthew and 
Mark shows that that sort of matter was not 
absolutely excluded. However much to be 
wished, however important it is to see light 
thrown upon that very early Christian litera- 
ture of which we find indications in the preface 
to Luke, in order to enable us to see the origin 
and the mutual relation of our synoptic Gos- 
pels cleared up, yet there is no use to be made 



papias. 189 

of Papias's statements so far as they stand alone 
and in contradiction to the sufficiently authen- 
ticated facts of his time. If he has nevertheless 
become a torch-bearer of critical theology in 
our time, and a leader under whose guidance 
we can be content to see the first two Gospels 
divided up into what are called their authentic 
and unauthentic constituent parts, there is little 
result gained thereby other than the rearing of 
an undeserved memorial to the bishop of Hiera- 
polis. 

Papias is the most acceptable and important 
ally of the opponents of John's Gospel. And 
why ? Papias is silent respecting this Gospel. 
Strauss and Renan, with their followers, 153 make 
great account of this silence as opposed to the 
belief in the authenticity of John's Gospel, and 
evidently consider it something which can not 
be surmounted. I fear that my readers would 
not find it so after what has been said above 
respecting the value of Papias's book. Does it 
not betray — I ask the reader himself — com- 
plete ignorance of what Papias has said re- 
garding his own undertaking, to quote him as 



190 OB I GIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

evidence against the Gospel of John ? His 
remarks respecting Mark and Matthew make no 
difference in the character of his whole hook. 
It is insisted, however, that Papias can not, 
from his silence, have known anything about 
the Gospel of John, still less have acknowl- 
edged its authenticity. Naturally here was 
supposed to be nothing less than decisive evi- 
dence against the genuineness of this Gospel ; 
yet Papias, the bishop of Hierapolis, belonged 
even to the neighborhood of Ephesus, whence 
John's Gospel must have gone forth into the 
world, and his work can scarcely have been 
written prior to the middle of the second cen- 
tury. A more groundless and trivial demand 
can hardly be made than to grant that the 
silence of Papias respecting the Gospel of 
John constitutes a strong argument against its 
genuineness. For, in the first place, to give 
evidence respecting this Gospel formed no part 
whatever of the plan of Papias ; and in the second 
place, from the fact that Eusebius has cited noth- 
ing from Papias's book respecting it, no infer- 
ence can justly be drawn that there was noth- 



EUSEBIUS. 191 

ing in that book which related to John's 
Gospel. The remarks respecting Mark and 
Matthew are not cited by Eusebius in confirma- 
tion of the genuineness of their Gospels, but 
simply in consequence of certain facts which 
they touch upon. In the case of John — and 
this is the only inference which can be ration- 
ally drawn from the silence of Eusebius — 
there were no circumstances which made it 
necessary to cite what related to him. 

Since, however, the opponents of John's Gos- 
pel have made so much account of the silence 
of Eusebius in this matter, I can not refrain 
from laying before the reader the great error into 
which they have fallen. They completely over- 
look the purpose which Eusebius had in view 
in writing. Respecting his object he expresses 
himself plainly enough (iii. 3 : i), where he says 
that he wanted to trace in the ecclesiastical 
writers what portion of the Antilegomena of 
the Xew Testament they had made use of, and 
what they have said about the Homologoumena, 
as 'well as what does not fall under this head. 154 
Everv one can see that this does not mean that 



192 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

he meant to inquire which writings, both of the 
Antilegomena as well as the Hornologoumena, 
they had used. In the case of the Antilego- 
mena, or New Testament writings of doubtful 
authority, the object is to indicate the use of 
passages cited, and in this way to make clear 
that this or that document was recognized. A 
similar effort is not made by him in the case 
of the Hornologoumena, or writings invariably 
recognized as authentic, but he seeks as ear- 
nestly as in the case of the other class, to collect 
ancient references to them, and what was an- 
ciently known respecting them. That this con- 
struction of his purpose is the only correct one, 
Eusebius shows not only in the case of Papias, 
but of all other writers who happen to come 
under his notice. He never says respecting 
any one of the Gospels, This one or that one has 
made use of it : this is much oftener the case 
in the allusion to the Catholic Epistles, 155 than 
to the Hebrews and the Apocalypse. But when 
he cites what he finds in the older writers rel- 
ative to the Gospels, he brings forward all that 
refers to their origin, the time when they were 



EUSEBIUS. 193 

written, and the occasion which gave them 
birth. This is the case with Irenaeus, of whom 
Eusebius writes (v. 8) the following: " Mat- 
thew wrote his Gospel among the Hebrews, in 
their own language, while Peter and Paul were 
preaching in Rome and strengthening the 
church. After their death, Mark, the disciple 
and interpreter of Peter, wrote, recording what 
Peter had preached. Luke, the companion of 
Paul, took down the Gospel as it was announced 
by the latter, and subsequently John, the disci- 
ple who lay on the Lord's breast, wrote his 
Gospel during his sojourn at Ephesus." Very 
instructive, moreover, are the extracts from 
Clement. Eusebius says (vi. 14) that Clement 
briefly treats in his Hypotyposa all the biblical 
writings, not passing over the Antilegomena. 
'• I mean," he goes on to say literally, " the 
Epistle of Jude, the other Catholic Epistles, that 
of Barnabas, and the Revelation ascribed to 
Peter." He allows the Epistle to the Hebrews 
to have been written by Paul, but in the Hebrew 
language. After further remarks respecting 
this Epjstle, Eusebius goes on to say : " But in 

13 



194 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the same treatise Clement communicates a tra- 
dition of the following import respecting the 
true order of the Gospels ; those were first 
written which contain a genealogical record. 
Mark's Gospel, moreover, had the following ori- 
gin : When Peter was publicly preaching in 
Rome, and, filled with the Spirit, was announ- 
cing the Gospel, Mark Was urged by many who 
were present, to put on record the statements 
of Peter, since he had long been Peter's com- 
panion and could remember the substance of 
his discourses ; and when in accordance with 
this request he wrote his Gospel, he communi- 
cated it to those who had asked for it. Peter, 
on his part, when he learned what Mark was 
doing, neither took ground against it, nor urged 
him to continue in it. And John, when he saw 
that that physical, active side of the Saviour 
had been fully delineated in the first three 
Gospels, gratified the wish of friends that he 
should portray Jesus on the spiritual side. 
This is what Clemens communicates.'" "We 
add to this what Eusebius (vi. 35) has taken, of 
similar purport, from Origen : that from tradi- 






EUSEBIUS. 195 

tion he had gathered that one of the four Gos- 
pels which had universal credence in God's 
church on earth, the one bearing the name of 
Matthew, at first a collector of customs and 
then an apostle of Jesus, was the one first writ- 
ten ; and that it was composed in the Hebrew 
tongue and dedicated to believers who had 
come out from Judaism. The second in the 
order of -the writing was Mark's, who had fol- 
lowed Peter's lead, and whom Peter himself 
recognizes in his catholic epistle as his son, — 
u My son Mark greeteth you." The third was 
Luke's, defended by Paul, and prepared for the 
use of those who were converted from heathen- 
dom. All these were followed by the one which 
bears the name of John. 

Now does not a glance show that all these 
passages from Irenaeus, Clemens and Origen 
were not quoted by Eusebius for the purpose of 
proving the genuineness of the Gospels, and 
just as little what Papias has to say about Mark 
and Matthew, but that they were recorded 
merely as interesting facts relative to the dis- 



193 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

tinctive history of each one of the evangelical 
records ? 

But we have the most striking confirmation 
of our view in extracts from writers still older, 
whose clear and distinct testimony to our Gos- 
pels and other Homologoumena, such as the 
Pauline Epistles, are passed over by Busebius 
in accordance with his general design, while he 
records what seemed to him to support the 
Antilegomena. Here Papias himself is at the 
head ; at any rate Busebius remarks expressly 
respecting him at the end of his treatise, that 
he had used proof texts from the First Epistle 
of John, and also from that of Peter. 158 Further 
he says (iv. 18 : 3) of Justin, that he had borne 
in mind the Apocalypse of John, and expressly 
allowed that it was written by the apostle ; 
but of the quotations from the Gospels found 
in him, he does not have a syllable. From 
Poly carp's Epistle to the Philippians he draws 
the statement (iv. 14) that he was indebted 
for many proof texts to the First Epistle of Pe- 
ter ; but of the far more numerous Pauline 
citations, taken from the majority of Paul's 



EUSEBIUS. 197 

Epistles, he says nothing. 157 Of Clemens Ro- 
manus he remarks that % he had taken many 
ideas from the Epistle to the*- Hebrews, and often 
in the original words, while he passes in silence 
over all quotations from the Pauline Epistles. 
From the three books of Theophilus to Autoly- 
cus, and from the one directed against the 
heresy of Hermogenes, he cites (iv. 14) nothing 
further than that in the latter he makes use of 
passages in the Apocalypse of John ; and yet 
Theophilus often and unmistakably uses the 
Pauline Epistles (e. g. Rom. ii. 6, et seq. ad Au- 
tolyc. i. 14 ; Rom. xiii. 7, et sq. ad Autolyc. iii. 
14) ; he even (and this is the most pertinent to 
our needs) cites the Gospel of John under that 
very appellation. 

With all this, do we not apprehend the aim 
of what Eusebius records ? And nlay we not 
steer clear of the long-continued perversion 158 of 
his purpose ? On our part, we are of the firm 
conviction that it needs only an upright deter- 
mination to discern the truth as it is in order 
to see the complete worthlessness of this famous 
Papias argument against the Gospel of John. 



198 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

The absurdity of the argument that the un- 
fortunate Bishop of Hierapolis, shortly before 
the middle of the second century, knew noth- 
ing of the writings of Luke and the Epistles of 
Paul, because, judging by Eusebius's silence, 
he made no mention of them, has been long 
perceived ; but very recently it has been set 
aside 159 by those who are the rudest opponents 
of ecclesiasticism, on the ground that the bishop 
may have been silent about things which he 
knew, but which seemed too trivial to men- 
tion. Still less trouble has it caused this party 
that, according to Eusebius's express testimony, 
Papias made use of the First Epistle of John. 
In the place, some pages back, where we had 
occasion to refer to Poly carp's use of this same 
Epistle, it was said that the evidence in favor 
of this Epistle is equally applicable to the Gos- 
pels ; but we asserted that not only had the 
identity of authorship in these two treatises 
been called into question, but that there has been 
a hasty impulse to cast the Epistle itself over- 
board. Thus Papias's silence was to bring the 
Gospel into utter disrepute, while, with his dis- 



INDIRECT EVIDENCE. 199 

tinct testimony, be could not shield the Epistle 
from the attacks of overbearing critics. 

In view of such proceedings, it is a genuine 
satisfaction to know that there has recently 
been brought to light a work printed long ago, 
but quite forgotten, in which Papias and his 
book give direct testimony in behalf of the Gos- 
pel, which is assaulted under the protection of 
his name. It is a prologue to the Gospel of 
John in a Latin manuscript of the Vatican 
(leaf 244), which, by a note in an old hand, is 
traced back to the possession of the Bohemian, 
Duke Wenceslaus (iste liber creditur fuisse 
Divi Venceslai Ducis Boemige), and which, 
according to the appearances of the writing, 
dates from the ninth centurv. It is now desis;- 
nated Vat. Alex. Xo. 14. 160 The prologue dis- 
closes that it was composed prior to the time 
of Jerome, and begins with the words, ;t Evan- 
gelium iohannis manifestatum et datum est 
ecclesiis ab iohanne adhuc in corpore consti- 
tute, sicut papias nomine hierapolitanus disci- 
pulus iohannis carus in exotericis id est in ex- 
tremis quinque libris retulit/' There can be 



200 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

no stronger testimony than this that Papias did 
give evidence in behalf of John's Gospel. The 
further purport of the prologue is, with all its 
brevity, rich in surprising facts. That it sprang 
from the work of Papias seems, however, on 
more grounds than one, to be doubtful ; and on 
this account the credibility of the other matters 
which it communicates can not be put on the 
same footing with the first. 161 

Before leaving Papias, however, we must re- 
vert to one source of evidence in favor of John's 
Gospel, which Irenaeus (v. 36 : 2) cites even from 
the lips of the presbyters, those high authorities 
of Papias : " And on this account they say that 
the Lord used the expression, ' In my Father's 
house are many mansions' " (John xiv. 2). As 
the presbyters put this expression 162 in connec- 
tion with the degrees of elevation granted to 
the just in the City of God, in Paradise, in 
Heaven, according as they bring their thirty, 
sixty, or a hundred-fold from the harvest, so 
nothing is more probable than that Irenaeus 
borrowed this whole expression of the presby- 
ter, together with the portraiture already re- 



PAPIAS 'S ^INDIRECT TESTIMONY. 201 

ferred to of the kingdom of a thousand years, 
from the work of Papias. Whether it comes 
from that source, however, or not, on every 
ground the authority of the presbyters stands 
higher than that of Papias ; it takes us back 
unquestionably to the close of the apostolical 
period. In what way, and with what machin- 
ery, the noted men with whom unbelief be- 
comes an art, and whose very efforts to propa- 
gate it are labored at with artistic ingenuity, 
will be able to set aside this evidence in sup- 
port of John's Gospel, and, together with the 
testimony of the presbyters, that of Papias in 
the Latin prologue to John, is not apparent 
to me ; yet I do not doubt that the skill which 
has defied all efforts to baffle it as yet, will be 
able to meet and overcome even this obstacle.. 

And lastly, we have to trace the bearings 
of New Testament textual criticism on the 
question under discussion. This is the science 
which has to do with the primitive documents 
of the sacred text, the direct bearer of saving 
truth. Investigation into these primitive docu- 
ments ought to throw light upon the history of 



202 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the sacred text ; i. e. we ought to learn from 
them what in all times Christendom has united* 
in finding recorded in the books which contain 
the New Testament; this, e.g., what Colum- 
ba, the pious and learned Irish monk of the 
sixth century ; what Ambrose at Milan, and 
Augustine in Africa, in the fourth century ; 
what Cyprian and Tertullian, in the third and 
second centuries, found recorded in their Latin 
copies of the New Testament : in like manner, 
what Photius, the patriarch of Constantinople, 
in the tenth ; Cyril, the Bishop of Jerusalem, in 
the fifth; Athanasius and Origen of Alexandria, 
in the fourth and third centuries, found on rec- 
ord in the Greek copies of their time. The 
final and highest object of these investigations 
consists in this, however, — to trace with exact- 
ness those expressions and words which the 
holy apostles either wrote with their own hand 
or dictated to others. If the New Testament 
is the most important and most hallowed book 
in the world, we must certainly lay the great- 
est value on all efforts to possess the text in 
which it was originally written in its most per- 



THE BIBLICAL TEXT. 203 

feet state, without omissions, without additions, 
and without changes. Should it be impossible 
to attain this result, still the task would at any 
rate be ours to approximate as closely as possi- 
ble to the primitive form of the text. 

The question will at once recur to many 
readers, Do our ordinary editions of the Bible 
not contain the genuine and true text ? The 
German Protestant, with his Luther's Bible in 
his hand, would ask this question ; so would 
the Catholic, with his Latin Vulgate, or his 
German or French translation of it ; so would 
the Englishman, with his Authorized Version ; 
so too would the Russian, with his Sclavonic 
text. The answer to this question, viewed 
from what side we will, is not light. Every 
one of these translations has again its own more 
or less rich text-history, and there is no one 
which has not enough of the original to insure 
the degree of faith necessary to salvation. But 
if the effort be made to see how closely each 
follows the original, how truly each has pre- 
served the text as it was given by the apostles, 
it must be compared with the original text, 



204 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

from which, directly or indirectly, all have 
flowed. We know that the Greek is the origi- 
nal text of the New Testament. And how is it 
with the genuineness of this text ? 

When the discovery of printing, in the first 
quarter of the sixteenth century, was applied to 
the publication of the Greek New Testament, 
Erasmus, at BSle, and Cardinal Ximenes, at 
Alcala, took as the basis of the work such man- 
uscripts as were at their command. Their edi- 
tions were repeated elsewhere, often with slight 
modification of the original text, according to 
other manuscripts. The learned Parisian print- 
er, Robert Stephens, introduced some such 
. modifications ; the Elzevir followed, the work 
of a Leyden printer ; and soon the force of 
usage became so powerful that the theologians 
accepted the text as it was established by the 
Erasmus, Elzevir, and Robert Etienne editions 
as a kind of authorized general edition. In the 
mean time, scholars had begun to trace new 
sources, — Greek manuscripts written in the 
first century, as well as manuscripts prepared 
for the translations effected in the first five cen- 



THE BIBLICAL TEXT. 205 

turies into Latin, Gothic, Coptic, Ethiopian, 
Armenian ; to these may be added the textual 
readings which are found recorded in the works 
of the church Fathers of the second century. 
From this there issued at last the result that, 
under the hand of the various transcribers, 
learned as well as unlearned, the New Testa- 
ment text has assumed extraordinary diversity 
in its readings. And, although this diversity 
is, in thousands of passages, limited to merely 
grammatical forms, having no relation to the 
sense, there is no lack of places which involve 
more important matters, and which are of his- 
torical and dogmatic value. After this had 
gone on so far that the whole of Christendom 
was interested in the highest degree in the 
matter, earnest men, with whom it was a sacred 
duty to ascertain what is truth rather than to 
conform with established usage, conceived that 
it was their especial task to reform the ordi- 
nary text by incorporating upon it the results 
of examining the ancient but later discovered 
manuscripts. Still, it is only in the most recent 
period that men have dared to lay aside the 



206 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

ordinary text, which had no scientific guaranty 
of authenticity, and to bring into exclusive use 
the text of the earliest documents. For it 
needs no proof that the oldest documents, those 
which run back to within a few centuries of the 
first composition, must be truer to the original 
than those which were written a thousand years 
or more subsequently to the first composition. 
In giving the preference to the most ancient 
documents, however, there is the rigid duty of 
examining them most carefully in respect to 
their intrinsic character and their mutual rela- 
tions. With this is to be coupled the fact that 
our various most ancient manuscripts give the 
text with a great diversity of readings, through 
which cause their use is made much more diffi- 
cult in establishing the original text given by 
the apostles. All the more necessary was it, 
therefore, to seek the oldest and most trustwor- 
thy of them all. In order to do this, Richard 
Bentley considered it important to give the 
preference to that text which shows the closest 
accordance with the oldest Greek documents 
and the Latin text of the fourth century. In 



THE BIBLICAL TEXT. 207 

accordance with Bentley's judgment, Carl Lach- 
maun undertook, with very few aids, tire resto- 
ration of the text which was generally diffused 
in the fourth century ; for there seems to be no 
possibility of reaching any documentary evi- 
dence which goes back of that age. There is 
no doubt that the earliest Latin translation of 
the Gospels — to limit ourselves to this — was 
written soon after the middle of the second 
century ; for, as I have had occasion to remark 
above, the Latin translator of Irenaeus, before 
the close of the second century, and Tertullian 
in the last decade of the same century, appear 
to have been in undisputed dependence upon 
it. This oldest translation we possess 163 at the 
present time, — certainly in its main body ; for 
our oldest documents, reaching back to the fifth 
century, and which bear relation to the text 
which was prepared in North Africa, the home 
of Tertullian, find a frequent confirmation of 
their readings in the two witnesses already 
mentioned, the translators of Irenaeus and Ter- 
tullian. And on this account, in behalf of 
those texts which men have not recorded in 



208 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

their writings, it must be admitted that they 
correspond to the very earliest edition, or are 
very nearly allied to it. By the discovery of 
the Sinaitic manuscript we have advanced yet 
farther ; for this text, which, on palseographical 
grounds, has been assigned by competent schol- 
ars to the middle of the fourth century, stands 
in such surprising alliance with the oldest Latin 
translation that it is really to-be regarded as 
coincident with the text which, soon after the 
middle of the second century, served the first 
Latin translator, the preserver of the so-called 
Itala, as a foundation. And that this text was 
not an isolated one is manifest from the fact 
that the oldest Syrian text, contained in a man- 
uscript of the fifth century, lately discovered in 
the Nitrian desert, as well as Origen and others 
of the earliest Fathers, stands in specially close 
connection with it. The Syrian text just men- 
tioned possesses on its side a power of carrying 
conviction quite analogous to the Itala, and 
manifesting it in that double way which I have 
endeavored to set forth ; for the latest investi- 
gations leave no doubt that the Peshito, which 






THE BIBLICAL TEXT. 209 

is universally ascribed to the close of the second 
century, presupposes the existence of the Ni- 
trian text, so that the latter must have arisen 
about the middle of the second century. 

What now follows from all these considera- 
tions in the way of answering the question 
which has been raised ? Two things we have 
to make use of and apply in the most emphatic 
manner. At the very outset of this work I 
have indicated it as a noteworthy fact, that soon 
after the middle, and even about the middle, of 
the second century, the four Gospels underwent 
an undoubted common translation, and ap- 
peared in a Latin as well as in a Syriac version. 
These translations not only prove the same 
thing which the harmonistic treatment of the 
Gospels by Tatian of Syria and by Theophilus 
at almost the same epoch proves ; they prove at 
the same time much more, namely, that as the 
Gospels of Luke and John were in existence at 
that time in the same form in which we have 
them now, so were those of Matthew and Mark. 
If isolated citations from the oldest epoch allow 
the suspicion that instead of our Matthew, the 

14 




210 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

nearly related and only subsequently discrim- 
inated Gospel of the Hebrews was perhaps 
used ? or that even our Mark had then taken 
that primitive form which is indicated in the 
recent investigations of Papias's account, yet 
the oldest Latin texts of these Gospels com- 
pletely exclude this suspicion, at least so far as 
the middle of the second century is concerned. 
They give thoughtful investigators as little 
ground for * believing that these texts might 
shortly before have been developed by unknown 
hands from a previous form, and now in an 
unskillful fashion, after the change which has 
been wrought upon them by the Latin Church, 
are held to be the original draft. Even hers 
the Nitrian text stands by the side of the 
Itala in confirmation of it, omitting, however, 
the Gospel of Mark, with the exception of 
the last four verses. It is well known that 
the discoverer and editor of this text ut- 
tered his conviction, and strengthened it with 
plausible proofs, that in the case of the Gospel 
of Matthew this text may have sprung from 
the original Hebrew form. In opposition to 



AN EARLY TEXT-HISTORY, 211 

this decidedly erroneous impression, the* agree- 
ment of the same Syrian text with our oldest 
Greek and Latin documents confirms in the 
most striking manner our conclusion in rela- 
tion to the Greek text of Matthew, as well as 
the conclusion that in the middle of the second 
century there was no other text of Matthew 
than the one which we possess. And so far as 
Mark is concerned, this Syrian translator bears 
witness in support of the closing verses already 
employed by Irenaeus, which, according to de- 
cisive critical authority, are not genuine, but 
which were appended to the accepted text of 
Mark's Gospel. 1 ^ 

But I have yet another matter of textual 
criticism to take note of, which in my judg- 
ment affords evidence that our collective Gos- 
pels are to be traced back at least to the begin- 
ning of the second or the end of the first cen- 
tury. As on the one side the text of the Si- 
naitie manuscript, together with the oldest Itala 
text, is to be assigned specifically to the use of 
the second century, so on the other side it is easy 
to establish that that same text, in spite of all 



212 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

its superiority over other documents, had as- 
sumed even their differences in many respects 
from the primitive purity of the reading, and 
that it even then presupposed a complete text- 
history. We are not directed in this exclu- 
sively to the Codex Sinaiticus and one or another 
of the Itala manuscripts, together with Irenaeus 
and Tertullian : but we can accept all these 
documents, which we must assign, partly from 
necessity and partly with the greatest proba- 
bility, to the second century ; the fact is unde- 
niable that there was even then a rich text-his- 
tory. We mean by this that even prior to the 
second half of the second century, while copy 
after copy of our Gospels was made, not only 
are there many errors of transcribers to be 
found, but the phraseology and the sense in 
particular places are changed, and larger or 
smaller additions are made from apocryphal 
and oral sources. With all this, such changes 
are not excluded which were the result of put- 
ting together separate parallel passages, and 
these testify in a striking manner to the early 
union of our Gospels in a single canon. If this 



AN EARLY TEXT-HISTORY. 213 

is really the case, there is an important stadi- 
um of the textual history of our four Gospels 
prior to the middle of the second century, prior 
to the time when canonical authority, together 
with the more settled ecclesiastical order, made 
arbitrary changes in the sacred text more and 
more difficult, — this I shall take occasion to 
show fully at another time, — and for the lapse 
of this history we must assume at least a half cen- 
tury. According to this, must not — I dare not 
say the origin of the Gospels, but — the estab- 
lishment of the evangelical canon be set at the 
close of the first century ? And is not this re- 
sult all the more certain from the coincidence 
with it of all the historical factors of the second 
century, which we have reviewed without any 
reserve ? 

There will be those, it is not to be doubted, 
who will accuse us of one-sidedness and want 
of thoroughness. And in truth we have passed 
over some things whose examination would 
have been in accordance with my purpose to 
pass in review all the oldest documents which 
could throw light upon the Gospels or illumi- 




214 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

nate their primitive recognition. If we have 
omitted anything, it is only because the infer- 
ences to be drawn from them touch too closely, 
as it has seemed to us, — perhaps wrongly, — 
upon the domain of hypothesis to give really 
solid results to our investigation. But in what 
we have passed over there is nothing which is 
antagonistic to what has been already advanced. 
We allude, e. g., to the earliest traces of a ca- 
nonic indication and collection of apostolic writ- 
ings, including the earliest appendices to the 
New Testament, and contained in a portion of 
the New Testament itself as the church estab- 
lished it in the fourth century. This is certainly 
the most recent portion, viz., the Second Epistle 
of Peter, where, (iii. 16), reference is made 
not only to the collection of the Pauline Epis- 
tles, but of other New Testament writings ; 165 
also the closing verses of John's Gospel, of 
which verse twenty-fourth is held with the most 
correctness as the oldest testimony from the 
hand of a presbyter of Ephesus in favor of 
John's authorship. 166 The Testaments of the 
twelve patriarchs, 167 too, contain undeniable 



MIS C ONCE P TIONS. 215 

traces of an acquaintance with the books of the 
New Testament, the Gospels as well as the 
Pauline Epistles and the Apocalypse ; they con- 
firm, therefore, the existence of a collection of 
the books of the New Testament at the time 
when they were written, and this time can 
scarcely be set later than the close of the first 
or the opening of the second century. 168 But 
so far as definite details are concerned, such as 
can be drawn into active service by those who 
are most determined in their opposition to 
John's Gospel, we can discover nothing but 
misunderstanding and unjustified conclusions. 
It is a misunderstanding, for example, to bring 
the celebration in Asia Minor ,of the feast of 
the Passover into antagonism with the Gospel 
of John ; for the festival as it is celebrated 
there, which builds simply upon the example of 
John, is erroneously understood as if it related 
to the Last Supper, while it really commemo- 
rates the death of Jesus the true paschal Lamb 
(1 Cor. v. 7), the historic basis being given for 
it in John's Gospel. But when men bring the 
relation of John's to the synoptic Gospels as 




216 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the ground for suspicion respecting the apos- 
tolic origin of the former, and cite the pecu- 
liarity of John's diction, as well as that of the 
Apocalypse, the universal character of his Gos- 
,pel compared with Gal. ii. 9, and its dogmatic 
character, especially in relation to the person 
of Christ, as brought into contrast with the his- 
tory of the Christian doctrine, they profess to 
know more than it is granted to man to 
know, and use what is .naturally hypothetical 
and uncertain to throw doubts over what is 
clear and fixed. Against tactics which rely 
upon the appearance of knowledge and cun- 
ningly shaped hypotheses, and which are 
shrewdly devised to entrap the simple, there 
is need of summoning the aid of definite and 
ascertained facts. 

We can only call it a welcome occurrence 
that through the radical character of the two 
most distinguished modern biographers of Je- 
sus, the Tubingen fantasy-builder and the Pa- 
risian caricaturist, the contrasts between belief 
and disbelief in the Gospels and the Lord 
have been made thoroughly apparent. It is 



PREVALENT ERRORS. 217 

only clear vision which leads to the gift of sure 
decision. Never before have theologians joined 
in with the Christian church and the whole 
world of culture in demanding so appositely as 
now. How is it down at the foundations, respect- 
ing our evangelical belief in the Lord ? Nothing 
is easier than to deceive those who are not in a 
position which enables them to answer in a 
scientific manner this greatest question of 
Christendom ; nothing "easier than to mislead 
them under a pretense of learned and honest 
investigation. Yet the character of this age 
grants all license to thorough and honorable 
inquiry in matters where, in former ages less 
intelligent than ours, faith, and a faith too 
that often enough was blind, had unquestioned 
sway. It is just from this that many who have 
not been able to enter deeply into this class of 
studies have come to believe that if we look 
at the matter thoroughly and scientifically 
there is a great deal of doubt about the facts of 
Jesus' life. And scarcely anything has had 
more factitious influence in inducing this in- 
credulity than the often-repeated statement that 



218 ORtGlUT OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

the ancient history of the Christian church 
gives the most conclusive testimony against the 
genuineness of our Gospels, especially that of 
John, in which the divine-human character of 
the Saviour of the world stands forth to the 
offense and confusion of an unchristian age 
more manifestly than in the synoptic Gospels. 
In the course of this investigation we have 
been brought to exactly the opposite view. To 
awaken doubts respecting the genuineness of 
our Gospels, and John's especially, in the minds 
of the lettered as well as the unlettered, to 
cause many to deny them even, is the work of 
that skeptical spirit which has attained to al- 
most undisputed pre-eminence during the past 
hundred years. And yet there are few instances 
in the collective literature of antiquity of so 
general and commanding assent being given to 
works of a historical character as to our four 
Gospels. 

Against that kind of unbelief which has 
taken root in the modern frivolous school of 
religious literature, in that earth-born emanci- 
pation of the human spirit which will allow of 



CONCLUSION. 219 

no subjugation by the Spirit of God, science lias 
no weapons. It is their unbelief which has in- 
corporated itself into Kenan's book : therein lies 
its power, its secret of success ; there is no 
need of learned inquiry respecting ft : the par- 
ti-colored rags which it has borrowed of science 
only partially conceal the naked limbs. It is 
quite otherwise with the learned arguments 
which have been brought against the life of 
Jesus, and the historic attacks which have been 
made upon the authenticity of the evangelical 
sources. Here we have to protest with the ut- 
most decisiveness, but on the ground of rigid 
scientific investigation. The victory of God 
in behalf of right belongs to truth alone. 
It is only a petty littleness of belief that can 
believe that the sacred interests of truth are 
imperiled by the use of those dishonored weap- 
ons which are so much in vogue in the present 
age. But whoever stands in the interest of 
that truth which is to enter into victory must 
display his faith in the result by no timid count- 
ing of costs, but by the constant exercise of 
his best knowledge and most conscientious en- 
deavors. 



NOTES. 



Note 1, p. 12. — Hilgenfeld's friends are more 
outspoken in this matter than even he is, while 
they completely echo his words. Thus Volkmar, 
p. 110 : " The Sinaitic Bible is asserted to have no 
greater value or significance than to make certain 
the fact that the canon of our four Gospels, as 
well as the whole Old Catholic New Testament, 
was in existence at the commencement of the 
the second century." P. 120 : " This which has 
been added is, therefore, a ne plus ultra ; in this 
phrase, scriptum est, are involved not only the 
canonicity of Matthew, but the fourfoldness of 
our Gospels, and the authenticity of the whole 
New Testament." In like tone A. Ritschl, in the 
Jahrb. fur deutsch. Theol. 1866, 2d pt. p. 355 : "But 
it is arbitrarily foisted upon the words of the here- 
siarch, as it is also an arbitrary supposition, that 
the church from the apostolic time down was fur- 
nished with the canon of the New Testament, and 
with bishops who were the successors of the apos- 
tles. And whoever trusts Tertullian so far as the 
former statement is concerned, has no right to re- 



222 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

fuse to recognize with him the apostolical succes- 
sion of bishops. As all the studies of Tischenclorf 
into the history of the canon lead him to believe 
that no one of the New Testament Scriptures can 
be looked at by itself and as destitute of canonical 
authority " [these words are intended to convey 
the meaning that the canonization of Matthew, tes- 
tified to by Barnabas, is to be confined to Matthew 
alone. That they signify no less than that the be- 
ginning of a canon of the New Testament can not 
be limited to a single document, can be clearly 
seen in the passage cited, and is there fully dwelt 
upon ; the ascribing of another meaning is a per- 
version of my words], " and as he finds himself 
obliged to assign the establishment of the canon to 
the close of the first century .... If, now, it is 
a result to be almost envied that one should con- 
vince himself so easily of the correctness of his 
judgment respecting the history of the New Testa- 
ment canon, they seem to be much more to be 
envied who want to confirm this result by holding 
^firmly to the doctrine of an apostolical appoint- 
ment of bishops who had authority commensurate 
with that of the apostles." These last words are 
a mere stupid joke, and are to be accounted as 
such; they are, therefore, of the same character, 
and are animated by the same spirit, as that which 
has caused other men to heap calumny upon me. 

Note 2, p. 14. — I might perhaps repel the charge 



xotes. 223 

» 
that an over-heated zealous activity, akin to that 

of the Snanish knight-errant, lies dormant in my 
words, by citing the expression of the " Wiener 
Allo-em. Literatur Zeituns: zunachst fur das kathol- 
ische Deutschland, Xo. 25 : " So far as real learning 
and familiarity with the subject are concerned, 
Strauss compared with Teschendorf is a pigmy by 
a giant." ..." One word of his weighs more than 
the whole book of another, however carefully pre- 
pared." 

Note 3, p. 17. — Zur Qaellenkritik des Epiph- 
anios, 1865, p. 68 : " Herakleon does not specifically 
mention Irenaeus." P. 168: "Epiphanios did not 
find the name of Herakleon mentioned in Irenaeus, 
but he unquestionably learned of Hippolytus what 
he knew about him." " Even the order is given 
by Irena?us. And just because he does not men- 
tion Herakleon, Epiphanios thinks that he must 
put him behind Mark." 

Note 4, p. 17. — This may do something toward 
clearing away the charge which has often been 
brought -against me, that I have not read Justin 
and others, and merely copy what I find in "In- 
troductions." 

Xote 5, p. 19. — The small, popular edition of this 
work has already been published in France by the 
Toulouse Societe des livres religieux, in England 



224 ORIGIN - OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

by the Religious Tract Society, and in America. 
In the latter country a German edition has also 
been issued. The French translator is Prof. Sard- 
inoux of Montauban, the English translator Mr. 
J. B. Heard, and the American, Prof. H. B. Smith. 

Note 6, p. 25. — Tacit. Annal. xv* 44. 

Note 7, p. 25. — Pliny's Epist. x. 97. 

Note 8, p. 25. — The statement of Suetonius 
(Claud. 25), that Claudius (about 52 after Christ) 
banished the Jews from Rome because, incited by 
Christ, they made a perpetual uproar, ought hardly 
to be cited here. 

Note 9, p. 28. — Renan, p. xxvii. On est tente 
de croire que Jean . . . fut froisse de voir qu'on 
ne lui accordait pas dans l'histoire du Christ une 
assez grande place ; qu'alors il commenca a dieter 
une foule de choses qu'il savait mieux que les autres, 
avec Tintention de montrer que, dans beaucoup de 
cas ou on ne parlait que de Pierre, il avait figure 
avec et avant lui. 

Note 10, p. 28. — Page xxvii. N'excluant pas 
une certaine rivalite de Fauteur avec Pierre. 

Note 11, p. 28. — Page xxvii. Sa haine contre 
Judas, haine anterieure peut-etre a la trahison. 



ROTES* 225 

Xote 12, p. 28. — Page 403. Seloii one tradition 
Jesus aurait trouve on appui dans la propre femnie 
du procurateur. Celie-ei avait pu entrevoir le 

doux Galileen de quelque fenetre du palais. don- 
nant sm 1 les coots du temple. Peut-etre le revit- 
elle en songe, et le sang de ee beau jeune homme, 
qui allait etre verse, lui donna-t-il le eaueliemar. 

Xote 13, p. 29. — Page 361. Peut-etre Lazare, 
pale encore de sa nialadie, se fit-il entourer de 
bandelettes comnie un mort et enfermer dans son 
tombeau de faniille. . . . L'eniotion qu'eprouva Je- 
sus pres du tombeau de son ami. quil eroyait mort, 
put etre prise par les assistants pour ce trouble, ce 
fremissement qui aeeompagnaient les miracles ; 
l'opinion populaire voulant que la vertu divine flit 
dans l'liomme comme un prineipe epileptique et 
convulsif. Jesus . . . desira voir encore une fois 
celui qu'il avait aime. et, la pierre ayant ete ecartee, 
Lazare sortit avec ses bandelettes et la tete en- 
touree d'un suaire. . . Intimement persuades que 
Jesus etait thaumaturge. Lazare et ses deux soeurs 
purent aider un de ses miracles a s'executer , . . 
L'etat de leur conscience etait celui des stigma- 
tisees, des convulsionnaires, de*s possedees de cou- 
vent. . . . Quant a Jesus, il n'etait pas plus maitre 
erne Saint Bernard, que saint Francois d' Assise de 
moderer Tavidite de la foule et de ses propres dis- 
ciples pour le merveilleux. La mort, d'ailleurs, 
allait dans quelques jours lui rendre sa liberte di-' 

15 



226 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR. GOSPELS. 

vine, et Farraeher aux fatales necessities cl'un role 
qui chaque jour devenait plus exigeant, plus diffi- 
cile a soutenir. 

Note 14, p. 29.— Matt, xxvi. 36, et sq. ; Mark xiv. 
32, et sq. ; Luke xxii. 40, et sq. 

Note 15, p. 30. — Page 378, et sq. 

Note 16, p. 30. — Page 209. La profonde 
secheresse de la nature aux environs de Jerusalem 
devait aj outer au deplaisir de Jesus. 

Note 17, p. 30. — Page 28. Si jamais le monde 
reste chretien, mais arrive a une notion meilleure 
de ce qui constitue le respect des origines, veut 
remplacer par d'authentiques lieux saints les sanc- 
tuaires apocryphes et mesquins oil s'attachait la pi- 
ete des ages grossiers, c'est sur cette hauteur de Naz- 
areth qu'il batira son temple. La, au point d' ap- 
parition du christianisme et au centre d'action de 
son fondateur, devrait s'elever la grande eglise ou 
tons les chretiens pourraient prier. La aussi, sur 
cette terre ou dorment le charpentier Joseph et 
des miliiers de Nazareens oublies. 

Note 18, p. 31. — Page 426. Sa tete s'inclina 
sur sa poitrine, et il expira. Repose maintenant 
dans ta gloire, noble initiateur. Ton ceuvre est 
achevee ; ta divinite est fondee. Ne crains plus de 



notes. 227 

voir erouler par une faute Fedifice de tes efforts. 
Page 67. Toute Fhistorie du christianisme nais- 
sant est devenue de la sorte une delieieuse pastor- 
ale. Un Messie anx repas de noces, la courtisane et 
le bon Zaehee appeles a ses festins, les fondateurs 
du royaume du eiel comine un cortege de para- 
nymphes. Page 219. Le eharmant docteur, qui 
pardonnait a tons pourvu qu'on Paimat, ne pouvait 
trouver beaucoup d'echo dans ce sanetuaire des 
vaines disputes et des sacrifices vieillis. Page 222. 
L'orgueil du sang lui parait 1'ennemi capital qiril 
faut combattre. Jesus, en d'antres termes, n'est 
plus juif. II est revolutionnaire au plus haut de- 
gre ; il appelle tons les honimes a un culte fonde 
but leur seule qualite d'enfants de Dieu. Page 316. 
Parfois on est tente de croire que, voyant dans sa 
propre niort un moyen de fonder son royaume. il 
coneut de propos delibere le dessein de se faire 
tuer. D'antres fois la mort se presente a lui comme 
un sacrifice, destine a apaiser son Pere et a sauver 
les homines. Un gout singulier de persecution et 
de supplices le penetrait. Son sang lui paraissait 
comme Feau d'un second bapteme dont il devait 
etre baigne, et il semblait possede dhme hate 
etrange d'aller au-devant de ce bapteme qui seal 
pouvait etaneher sa soifi. 

Note 19. p. So. — That this was the true date 
when this catalogue was proposed, is rendered 
more certain by the circumstance that the author 



228 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

indicates the episcopate of Pius, which is generally 
computed to have extended from 142 to 157, by 
the words temporibus nostris and nupemme, i. e. 
" in our time," and " very recently." And even 
when he follows his own conjectures, or those which 
were then general, respecting any matter, as, 
for example, his ascribing the "Shepherds," an 
apocalyptic book of edification, to Hernias the 
brother of Pius the Roman bishop, his chronolo- 
gical statements must still be conceded not to have 
lost any validity. 

Note 20, p. 38. — See Iren. adv.hsBres. iii. 11 : 8. 

Note 21, p. 39. — See Iren. adv. hser. iii. 3; 4; 
and particularly his letter to Florinus in Euseb. 
Hist. Eccl. v. 20 (Iren. opp. ed. Stieren i. 822). 

Note 22. p. 40. — In the Latin translation the 
passage runs : " Vidi enim te, quum adhuc puer 
(rt(ii^) essem, in inferiore Asia apud Polycarpum 
quum in imperatoria aula splendid e ageres et illi 
(TtaQ* avrq}) te probare conareris. Nam ea quaa 
tunc gesta sunt melius memoria teneo, quam quae 
nuper acciderunt (quippe quae pueri discimus, 
simul cum animo ipso coalescunt eique penitus 
inhaerent) adeo ut et locum dicere possim in quo 
sedens beatus Polycarpus disserebat, processus quo- 
que eius et ingressus vitaeque moclum et corporis 
speeiem, sermones denique quos ad multitudinem 



NOTES. 229 

habebat ; et familiarem consuetudineni quae illi 
cum Iolianne ac reliquis qui dominum viderant in- 
tercessit, ut narrabat, et qualiter dicta eorum com- 
memorabat: quaeque de domino ex ipsis audiverat 
de miraculis illius etiam ac de doctrina, quaa ab iis 
qui verbum vitae ipsi conspexerant acceperat Poly- 
carpus, qualiter referebat, cuncta Scripturis con- 
sona." The attempt to make these closing words 
apply to the Old Testament, and not to the Gos- 
pels, is a most impotent attempt to take away all 
point whatever from what Irenaeus is saying. 

Note 23, p. 43. — See adv. Marcion, iv. 2. Con- 
stituimus in23rimis evangelicum instrumentum apos- 
tolos auctores habere, quibus hoc niunus evan- 
gelii promulgandi ab ipso domino sit compositum ; 
si et apostolicos, non tamen solos sed cum apostolis 
et post apostolos. Denique nobis fidem ex apos- 
tolis Iohannes et Matthaeus insinuant, ex apostol- 
icis Lucas et Marcus instaurant. 

Note 24, p. 43. — See adv. Marcion, iv. 5. In 
summa si constat id verius quod prius, id prius 
quod et ab initio, ab initio quod ab apostolis, pariter 
utique constabit id esse ab apostolis traditum quod 
apud ecclesias apostolorum fuerit sacrosanctum. 

Note 25, p. 45. — See the document already re- 
ferred to : Eadem auctoritas ecclesiarum ceteris 
quoque patrocinabitur evangeliis, quae proinde per 



230 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

illas et secundum illas habemus, Johannis dico 
[before this he says, habemus et Johanni alumnas 
ecclesias] et Matthaei ; licet et Marcus quod edidit 
Petri affirmetur, cuius interpres Marcus. Nam 
et Lucsb digestum Paulo adscribere solent; capit 
magistrorum videri qua3 discipuli promulgarint. 

Note 26, p. 46. — Theophilus was appointed 
bishop of Antioch, according to the statement of 
Eusebiu's (Hist. Eccles. iv. 19 and 20), about the 
eighth year of Marcus Aureiius's reign, i. e., about 
168, at the same time that Soter was bishop of 
Rome. The third book of his able Apology to 
Autolycus he wrote, according to his own state- 
ment, in the year 181 ; the first two books in the 
year 180. It is extremely probable that the com- 
pilation from the Gospels was intended to serve in 
helping him discharge his official duties, — at the 
outset, at least, of his term of service. 

Tatian himself tells us (Orat. ad Grsec. 19) that 
when in Rome together with Justin he shared the 
persecution experienced by the cynic philosopher 
Crescens. After Justin had fallen as a martyr, Ta- 
tian left Rome ; in Syria, where he lived subse- 
quently, he embraced the Gnostic heresies ; at the 
time when Irenaaus was preparing his work aimed 
against this school, i. e. about 177, Tatian does not 
appear to have been living. Comp. Iren. adv. haer. 
1 : 28. Tatian can not have written his celebrated 
apologetic work, Addresses to the Heathen, before 



NOTES. 231 

his teacher's death (166), but he may have done so 
soon after. In all probability, however, he had 
prepared the Diatessaron still earlier. 

Note 27, p. 46. — See epist. 151 ad Algasiam 
qusest. 5. Theophilus . . . qui quatuor evangelist- 
arum in unuin opus dicta compingens ingenii sui 
nobis monimenta reliquit, haec super hac parabola 
[the one respecting the Unjust Steward] in suis 
commentariis locutus est. 

Note 28, p. 47. — See Euseb. Histor. Eccles. iv. 

29. 

. - * *. 

P Note 29, p. 47. — See Theodoret. haeret. fab. i. 

20. 

Note 30, p. 47. — Jerome, in the passage already 
cited, as well as elsewhere (in his Catalogus de Vi- 
fis Illustribus), alludes to Theophilus as the author 
of a commentary on the Gospel (a term applied, 
according to the usage of that time, to the four 
Gospels co-ordinated into a single narrative), and 
even makes use of it in explaining the parable of 
the Unjust Steward ; it is very probable, therefore, 
that this commentary was bound up with the Gos- 
pels. 

Note 31, p. 52. — Hegesippus wrote a history 
of the church, coming down to JEleutheros, bishop 
of Rome, who is generally thought to have been 



232 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

■* 

in office from 177 to 193. Eusebius has made 
extensive use of this work (iv. 8 and 22) in prepar- 
ing his own history, and gives its author great 
credit for the reliability of all his statements, and 
for his doctrinal soundness (iv. 21). In addition 
to the fragments which Eusebius has preserved, we 
possess another statement respecting Hegesippus, 
taken by Photius from Stephanus Gobarus, a mono- 
physite living at the close of the sixth century, and 
incorporated in his Bibliotheca, No. 232, Bekker's- 
edition, p. 288. In the fragments of Stephanus 
Gobarus, we read, in connection with the quota- 
tion, " Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, neither 
have entered into the heart of man the things 
which God hath prepared for them that love him, 5 ' 
that Hegesippus declared that this was a vain and 
meaningless saying, and that all such passages are 
in contradiction to the sacred scripture and to the 
words of the Lord, " Blessed are the eyes which 
see the things that ye see, and the ears that hear the 
things that ye hear." From this passage in Ste- 
phanus Gobarus it is not clear against whom or 
against what false cioctrine Hegesippus's animad- 
version was directed. It is most probable that he 
aimed chiefly at a docetic error respecting the per 
son of Christ. As Paul quoted the words cited 
above, from 1 Cor. ii. 9, either from Isaiah lxiv. 3 
and 4, or, as Origen supposed, from an apocryphal 
book known by the name of Elias, it became the 
belief of certain theologians that Hegesippus in- 



NOTES. 233 

tended to reject the Epistles of Paul, and to con- 
demn the validity of his doctrine. Nor did they 
hesitate to go further, and grant that, admitting 
that the passage in Corinthians was a free quota- 
tion from Isaiah, they should have to reject that as 
well. They even went so far as to bring Eusebius 
under suspicion, and to hint that he had willfally 
perverted ecclesiastical history. 

Note 32, p. 52. — The apocalyptic, ethical work, 
known as the " Shepherd," had quotations neither 
from the Old nor from the New Testament ; there 
is no lack of references in it, however. 

Note 33, p. 53. — See, for example, chap. 35 : 
"While we put away from us all injustice and 
wickedness, avarice, contention, cunning and de- 
ceit, slander and calumny, blasphemy, pride and 
self-seeking, ambition and vanity : for they who 
do such things are displeasing to God, and not 
alone they who do them, but they that have pleas- 
ure in them who do them." Comp. Rom. i. 29, et 
seq. 

Note 34, p. 53. — In chap. 46 : " Woe to that 
man : it were better for him if he had not been 
born, than that he should offend one of my chosen 
ones : it were better that a millstone were hanged 
about his neck and he were cast into the sea, than 
that he should offend one of my little ones." These 






234 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. . 

words are cited expressly on the " saying of our 
Lord ; " they disclose, however, much more clearly 
the very phrase taken from his lips and repeated 
in the apostle's tradition, than the use of the sim- 
ilar passages in Matt. xxvi. 24; xviii. 6 ; and Luke 
xvii. 2. 

Note 85, p. 56. — " That which is born of the 
flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is 
spirit. . . . The wind bloweth where it listeth, 
and thou hearest the sound* thereof, but canst not 
tell whence it cometh or whither it geeth. So is 
every one that is born of the Spirit." 

Note 36, p. 56. — "For every one that doeth 
evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, 
lest his deeds should be reproved." 

Note 87, p. 62. — So, for example, Medner's 
History of the Christian Church, p. 206 : " The 
first, the greater, at the time of Antoninus Pius, in> 
138 or 139; the second, the smaller, under Marcus 
Aurelius, soon after 161." The same statement is 
made by Neander (Gen. Hist, of the Christ. Rel. 
and Chur., 3d ed. i. 1, p. 364, et sq.) : " Since in the 
superscription he does not speak of M. Aurelius as 
Caesar, it is probable that it was written before his 
promotion to the imperial dignity, which took 
place in 139." Thereupon he alludes to the " greater 
difficulty" which the determination of the time 



NOTES. 235 

when the shorter Apology was written cost him, 
and states that he could come to no decision re- 
specting it. 

Note 38, p. 62. — The passage (i. 46) runs, "In 
order that it may not be said in senseless perver- 
sion of what I have stated' respecting Christ's be- 
ing bom under Quirinus 150 years ago, his teach- 
ing what may be called his system under Pontius 
Pilate, and the inference which might be drawn 
that all men born before his time were free from 
guilt, I will meet this matter at the very outset." 
Every one can see in these round numbers, and in 
this mode of expression, how little the writer 
meant to assign a definite date to the composition 
of the Apology. Still, the year 147 is the one 
which, according to our ordinary computation, is 
assigned as the date when it was written. That 
in the Apology of Marcion the subject is alluded 
to as one occupying the public mind, has no vital 
relation to the time which we have specified, al- 
though to the statement of Irenseus that Marcion 
was in Rome with Cerdo at the time of Hyrinus 
(generally set between 137 and 141), must be 
added that of the Arabic biographers of Maui, ac- 
cording to which Marcion came into notice in the 
first year of Antoninus Pius, 138 : for the year 
139 can not be coupled with this event. That 
Justin cites in the Apology his work against Mar- 
cion ("and the Marcionites" does not appear in 






23 G ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

in the title), is said without truth. For in i. 26 
he alludes to his work " Against all Heresies ," not 
to that "Against Marcion;" the latter is cited by 
Irenaeus, iv. 6 : 2," after a citation of the first-named 
work of Jerome in the catalogue. One circum- 
stance opposed to this is not to be overlooked. If, 
with the pushing back of the first Apology to the 
year 147, the connection of the second and the 
first be insisted on, and the latter is regarded as a 
mere appendix to the former, the assigning of so 
early a date to the former becomes the more im- 
probable from the fact that Justin alludes in the 
same to the persecutions of Crescens following him 
even to his death. This seems to me to give more 
decisive evidence against the connection of the 
two, than the existing reference in the second to 
what is said in the first does for that connection. 

Note 39, p. 62. — If the freedom be taken to 
come from this date down to 150, there is an equal 
right to go back several years before 147. 

Note 40, p. 63. — By way of illustration, we 
may cite the passage which is given three times 
in the Dialogue (chaps. 76, 120 and 140), "They 
shall come from the east and from the west, anct 
shall sit down in the kingdom of heaven with 
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob ; but the children 
of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer dark- 
less." This coincides literally with Matt, viii, 11 



xotes, 237 

and 12, excepting that in the latter we have the 
reading "many shall come." In like manner in 
the Dialogue (chap. 107) we have,. "It is written 
in the Memorabilia, that your country folk asked 
him and said, £ Show us a sign.' And he answered 
them, 4 An evil and an adulterous generation seek- 
eth after a sign, and there shall no sign be given 
them but the sign of the prophet Jonas. 5 " This 
reply of the Lord coincides literally with Matt, 
xii. 40, with the mere use of " them " for " it." 

Note 41, p. 63. — Respecting Luke xxii. 44, 
it runs, for instance, that Justin alludes in the Dia- 
logue (chap. 103) to the sweat which ran down in 
great drops while Jesus was on the mount of 
Olives, and, indeed, it is stated with express refer- 
ence to the " Memorabilia composed by his apos- 
tles and their companions." Twice (chaps. 76 and 
100) he cites as a saying of the Lord: "The Son 
of man must suffer many things, and be rejected 
by the scribes and Pharisees (chap. 100, ' by the 
Pharisees and scribes'), and be crucified, and on 
the third day rise again." This agrees more closely 
with Mark viii. 31 and Luke ix. 21, than with Mat- 
thew xvi. 21 ; only in Justin the reading is the 
"Pharisees" instead of the "elderg and high priest" 
(as in Matt., Mark, and Luke), and in like manner 
"be crucified" instead of "be slain." 

Note 42, p. 63, — Among these is Theodoret's 



238 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

ILeret. Fab. ii. 2, according to which that which is 
said everywhere else respecting the Gospel of the 
Hebrews is asserted to have been in use among: 
the Nazaraaans. Eusebius reports (Hist. Eccl. vi. 
12) the judgment of Serapion, bishop of Antioch, 
regarding this matter. The latter found the 
most of it conformable to the true faith, but de- 
tected here and there something superadded even 
in the sense of the Docetes, which he ascribed to 
the influence of that community in Rhossus in Cili- 
cia, where he found the book in use. Origen, in 
his comment on Matt. xiii. 54, et sq., states that, 
like the work of James, this reports the " brethren 
of Jesus" to be children of Joseph by a former 
marriage. 

Note 43, p. 64. — A few examples may illustrate 
the character of the argument between Justin and 
the Clementine Homilies. Both Justin and the 
psuedo-Clement concur in this : " Let your yea be 
yea and your nay nay ; whatever is more than this 
cometh of evil." In Matthew, however, it stands 
thus : " But let your communication be yea, yea, 
and nay, nay; for whatsoever is more than this 
cometh of evil." The first of these forms coincides, 
however, almost literally with that which is found 
in James v. 12, "But let [//to), Justin and the 
pseudo-Clement fozoa] your yea be yea, and your 
nay, nay." Further, we have in Justin, i. Apol. 
chap. 16, "Not all who say unto me, Lord, Lord, 



XOTE>, 239 

shall come into the kingdom of heaven, but they 
that do the will of my Father who is in heaven. 
For he who heareth me and cloeth what I say. he 
heareth him that sent rne." In the Homilies (8 : 7) 
it runs, "Jesus said to one who often called him 
Lord but did none of his commandments, ' TVhv 
callest thou me Lord, Lord, and doest not what I 
say ? ' n Herewith compare Matt. vii. 21, " Xot every 
one that saith unto me Lord, Lord, shall enter into 
the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the 
will of my Father which is in heaven.*' In like 
manner, Luke x. 16, "He that heareth you heareth 
me; and he that despiseth you despiseth me; and 
he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me." 
For the last clause the Cambridge Codex, with 
three old Latin manuscripts, offers the reading, 
"But he who heareth me, heareth him who sent 
me." Another well accredited reading of the 
greatest antiquity adds to the standard version the 
words, •* And he that heareth me, heareth him that 
sent me." They take out, however, from Justin 
(and the Homilies) the phrase, " and doeth what I 
say,*' in order to show a reference to some other 
source. Two other examples which illustrate this 
matter will be found in the following note. 

Xote 44, p. 65. — It is very doubtful whether 
from the way in which Justin cites Matt. xi. 27, 
and especially in view of the transposition, we are 
rio-ht in forming; conclusions as to a source differ- 






240 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

ent from the Gospel of the church, in spite of- the 
close resemblance between the Homilies and Jus- 
tin's citation. The passage runs in Matthew, 
" No one knoweth (ImyivcoGxei, several very ancient 
authorities yivioawi) but Clemens of Alexandria 
often, Origen often, Irenaeus often, and Didymus, 
syvo), 'knew') the Son but the Father; neither 
knoweth (as before) any man the Father save the 
Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal 
him " (but Clemens of Alex, often, Origen often, 
IrenaBus twice, and Tertuliian, "and to whom" — 
Irenaeus " and to them to whom " the Son may re- 
veal him). In Justin (Dial. 100, 1st Apol. 63) we 
have " No one knoweth (twice ' knew ') the Father 
save the Son, nor the Son save the Father, and 
those to whom the Son "shall reveal him." In the 
Homilies xvii. 4, xviii. 4 and 13, "No one knows 
the Father save the Son, as also no one knoweth 
the Son (oidsv, xviii. 3, 'nor knoweth any one the 
Son) save the Father and they to whom the Son 
will reveal him.' Epiphanius has this transposi- 
tion (in the fourth century) seven times in eleven 
citations, and twice does it occur even in Irenaeus, 
who in a third place still has a reading which is 
peculiar to the Gnostics. We may notice the 
other details of this verse, in which very early 
changes of the text are unmistakable, without hav- 
ing to say, This is the canonical, this the hereti- 
cal text. Compare in this passage my Greek Tes- 
tament, eighth edition, first part. 



XOTES. 241 

So in Matt. xxv. 41: "Depart (TtOQevea&s) from 
me, ye accursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for 
the devil and his angels." Justin (Dial. 76) and 
the pseudo-Clemens have, "Depart (vitdyere) into 
outer darkness which the Father has prepared for 
the devil (pseudo-Clemens ' Satan') and his angels." 
Here not only has the Sinaitic Codex the same 
expression indyixz, but the Cambridge, which is 
allied to it, together with the oldest Latin' wit- 
nesses, and Irenseus and Tertullian as well, have 
also, " which my Father has prepared for the devil 
and his ano-els." 

So, too, from the passage in the Homilies xviii. 
17, " Enter through the strait and narrow way, 
through which you will pass into life," there has 
been an attempt to draw an inference in favor of 
an extra-canonical source ; but several of the old- 
est witnesses to the text, among them the Sinaitic 
Codex, lead to the supposition that Matt. vii. 13 
and 14 was read at the most remote period as fol- 
lows : " for broad and wide is the way," " for strait 
and narrow is the way," instead of " for wide is 
the gate and broad is the way," " for strait is the 
gate and narrow is the way." 

Xote 45, p. 6Q. — Throughout the whole Gos- 
pel of John this exclusively Johanneail designation 
does not appear again; it is found only in the 
Apocalypse xix. 13, and as the "TTord of life" at 
the beginning of the Epistle of John. Is it to be 
16 



242 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

expected that Justin, if he did indeed draw from 
John, would use this term exclusively or with 
marked signs of preference ? 

Note 46, p. 68. — Comp. Volkmar, Ursprung 
unserer Evangelien, p. 95: "Justin contains the 
root of that which is. cited in the Gospel of John, 
the beholder of the Lamb (Rev. v. 12; i. 5), or 
rather, Justin himself appears as one of the sources 
in favor of the later transformations of this latest 
Gospel." " Much more clearly does the most exact 
trial reveal this : that the one who tells of the Logos 
follows him who teaches regarding the Logos, the 
post-John follows the martyr substantially in all 
things ; and it is beyond all doubt that Justin at 
least never saw this new Gospel. So far as the 
formula is concerned, it is not only wholly possible, 
but even probable, yes, the one thing probable, that 
the one who tells of the Logos was not only really 
but was also recorded to have been in the school 
of Justin, the teacher of the Logos." 

Note 47, p. 69. — The word TtrJQog has defini- 
tively and preferably the signification "blind," as the 
explanations in Hesychius and Suidas show ; so too 
the whole passage, belonging here, Constitut. v. 7 : 
17, where the blind man of John's Gospel as well 
as of Justin is called o tx yevertjg mjoog. 

Note 43, p. 69. — In. both passages Justin has 



xotes. 243 

the literal expression of John ix. 1, in yhv&tfjg, which 
is almost never elsewhere used in reference to 
miraculous accounts of the Gospels. Justin, too, in 
his Apology, puts it in immediate connection with 
the blind, after naming the lame and the palsied. 
The same seems to be true, too, of the passage in 
the Dialogue, although the expression is capable 
of being; connected with the deaf and the lame. 

Note 49, p. 69. — The emphatic expression of 
John and Justin, iv> yevartjg^ does not appear here, 
but tysvv/^jjv. 

Note 50, p. 70. — That the translation of John 
found a place in some of our manuscripts of the 
Septuagint, is no less than an evidence in favor 
of a primitive translation followed by Justin and 
John, and at variance with the text of the Seventy. 
Naturally Tertullian (de resurr. earn. 26) as well as 
Theodotus (excerpt. 62) follow John's Gospel; 
whereas another passage of Tertullian (de earn. 
Christ. 24, also adv. Marc. 3, 7, and adv. Iud. 14, 
both as far as " tribus acl tribuni ") attaches itself 
rather to the Apocalypse i. 7. The seventh chap- 
ter *of the Epistle of Barnabas must also be brought 
into connection with the same passages of John. 

Note 51, p. 70. — The form retained in our 
translation, "be born again," which is in accordance 
with the Vulgate, is literally justified by, and is 



244 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

significantly recommended in the answer of Nico- 
demus. So, too, the explanation of the new birth 
made by Jesus, in the fifth verse, to Nicodernus, is 
much more closely allied with being " born again " 
than with being born "from above." Many com- 
mentators, however, ancient as well as modern, 
prefer the expression " from above." If, however, 
this reading is to be taken in the sense as if the 
expression of Justin did not conform to that of 
John, and therefore discloses another origin than 
John's Gospel, it is singularly thought possible to 
decide how Justin was obliged to understand 
John's expression. But see the next note. 

Note 52, p. 71. — In order to deny the connec- 
tion of the Justinian quotation with the passage 
from John, it has been asserted that the expression 
used in the first, the "kingdom of heaven" ($aa- 
Xeca rcov ovQav<xtv\ is not Johannean. But the same 
expression is so strongly authenticated in the fol- 
lowing fifth verse, by the Sinaitic Codex, by the 
Docetes in Hippolytus, by a newly discovered frag- 
ment of Irenaeus (in Harvey, p. 498), by the apos- 
tolical constitutions, and by Origen (in the Inter- 
pres), that it must be regarded as in the original. 
(Accepted in 1864 in my synopsis.) I must remark 
in addition, that the fragment of Irenaeus has dva- 
ynvvrfti] (born again) instead of John's yewij&q : it 
shows how much it lay at heart with Justin and oth- 



NOTES. 2-45 

ers to give the idea of John's yerrrft^ am&sp (bora 
anew) by diayenrifrTc (horn again). 

Xote 53. p. 71. — For this view is claimed the 
similarity, also, which the quotation in the pseudo- 
Clementines, xi. 26. has with that of Justin: -for 
thus says the prophet. -Verily I say unto you, ex- 
cept ye be born again with living water in the 
name of the Father, ye can not come into the king- 
dom of heaven." 1 The significance of this sim- 
ilarity is to be inferred from what has been ex- 
pressed in the previous notes. That the earlier 
expressly denied dependence on John's Gospel is 
to be discerned in the newly discovered close of his 
Homilies, may be seen further on. Compare what 
is said under the head i; Xaasenians." 

Xote 54. p. 72. — John uses the expression 
-kingdom of God r ' only in hi. 3 ; it is often met. on 
the contrary, in Luke, 'both in the Gospel and the 
Acts; often, too. in Mark, and several times in 
Matthew. 

Note 55, p. 73. — See Dialogue, chap. 103. In 
the Latin version the passage runs. " in commen- 
tariis quos ab eius apostolis et eorum seetatcfribus 
scriptos die 

Xote 56, p. 76. — In the same sense the passage 
in the fifth chapter of the Epistle to the Philadel- 



46 



ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



phians appears to have authoritative weight: "while 
I curse myself before the Gospel, as the body of 
Jesus, and before the apostles as the elders of the 
church. But the prophets we will love because 
they have prophesied of the Gospel and have hoped 
and waited for the Lord." By the expression the 
" Gospel as the body of Jesus," in its connection 
with the apostles and prophets, is probably to be 
meant the written Gospel in the hands of the 
church. 






Note 57,p.79. — See my Notitia editionis cod. Sin. 
cum catalogo codicum, etc., p. 58 et sq. The MS. of 
the Gospels indicated under No. 2, in my collection 
of Greek MSS. dating probably from the ninth cen- 
tury, contains in three passages of Matthew, the 
parallels of the Hebrews' Gospel (called to iovbahtov). 
At Matt. iv. 5, we have " to Jerusalem," not " into 
the holy city." At xvi. 17 is the reading via ioodvvov 
(son of John), not fiagiwvci (s*on of Jon a). At xviii. 
22, in the Hebrews' Gospel, after the words "seventy 
times seven," the addition, "for in the prophets., 
too, after that they were anointed with the Holy 
Ghost, was sin found" (literally the "word of 
sin," Xoyog a\ia(Ytiag) . This remarkable passage was 
given by Jerome in the Latin form. At xxvi. 74, 
it is asserted that instead of the words " then he 
began to curse and to swear," the Hebrews' Gos- 
pel reads, " and he denied and swore and cursed." 
Such a parallelizing of special passages as we find 



NOTES. 247 

here would be irrational, yes, impossible, had the 
Hebrews' Gospel not the same character, the same 
tone, and in the main the same language, with that 
of Matthew. And if some of the patristic quotations 
from it do not seem to give special support to this 
view, it is not to be forgotten that these citations 
must be made where there are deviations from 
Matthew's reading, and that they are represented 
to us as such. 

Xote 58, p. 81. — See adv. haer. iii. 11: 7. 
"Tanta est auteni circa evangelia haec firmitas, ut 
et ipsi hseretici testimonium reddant eis, et ex ipsis 
egrecliens unusquisque eorum conetur suam con- 
firmare doctrinam." 

Xote 59> p. 83. — Tremens iii. 4 : 3 (and follow- 
ing him Eusebius iv. 11) makes him come to 
Rome at the time of Hippolytns, between 137 and 
141. 

Xote 60, p. 84. — See adv. haer. iii. 11 : 7. Hi 
auteni qui a Valentino sunt, eo (sc. evangelio) quod 
est secundum Johannem plenissime utentes ad os- 
tensionem conj ligation um suarum, ex ipso detegen- 
tur nihil recte dicentes, quemadmodum ostendimus 
in primo libro. 

Xote 61, p. 84. — See adv. haer. i. 8 : 5. . Adhuc 
autem Johannem diseipulum domini docent pri- 












248 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

mam Ogcloadem et omnium generationem signifi 
casse ipsis dictionibus, etc. 

Note 62, p. 85. — See Philosophum. vi. 35. Liter 
ally the passage runs : Therefore all the prophets, 
and the law spoken of as Demiurgos, a foolish god, 
sunk in folly and ignorance (tldlrjoav with rov Srjiii- 
ovQyov . . . [jicoqoI ovdsv eldorsg). On this account, ac- 
cording to Valentine, the Saviour says, " All that 
before me," etc. 

Note 63, p. 85. — Appeal is made especially to 
i. 8 : 1-4, and 8:5; yet in the former of these only 
the three first Gospels are referred to, in the latter 
only the last ; moreover, they are alluded to only 
by Ptolemy, whose name is given in the Latin 
text (" Et Ptolemgeus quidem ita ; " in the Greek 
text these words are lacking) at the end of the ac- 
count. At 8 : 1-4, however, Irenaeus refers to the 
Valentinians, not to Valentine. Can it be said, 
however, that 1-4 is the master with his pupils, 
and that in the fifth section only the pupil is 
meant ? 

Note 64, p. 91. — Compare, with reference to 
this, the Preface. 

Note 65, p. 91. — "Si autemnon prolatum est 
sed a se^generatum est, et simile est et fraternum et 
eiusdem honoris id quod est vacuum ei patri, qui 



NOTES. 249 

praedictus est a Valentino; antiquius autem et 
multo ante exsistens et honorificentius reliquis aeon- 
ibus ipsius Ptoleinaei et Heracleonis, et reliquis om- 
nibus qui eadem opinantur." 

N~ote 66, p. 92. — r O x^g Ovatevzi'ivv (S%ok^g doxc- 
[xwrawg is the expression of Clemens. 

Note 67, p. 92. — Tbv Ovahrzirov fayouerov efocu 
yvcQQifiov 'Hoay./Jwi'a. 

Note 68, p. 92. — Comp. Orig. contr. Ceis. 5. 
6 MaQxmvog yvcooiuog idrteXkijg, alo&aecog nvog ysvofis- 
vog naxrfo and the Tert. de earn. Chr. 1. "Apel- 
les discipulus et postea desertor ipsius" (id est, 
3Iarcionis) ; Psuedo-Tertull. de praescr. hseret. LI. 
" Apelles discipulus Marcionis qui . . . postea . . . 
a Marcione segregatus est." Comp. also Hippol. 
Philosoph. vii. 12. 

Xote 69, p. 92. — But is the real meaning of 
Ksodcov diadEynai 'Hoay.lmva^ Cerdo follows Herak- 
leon? Is it not rather, Cerdo follows in my work on 
Herakleon ? If any one should happen to be pleased 
with this burlesque style of exposition, he will 
"scarcely be able to persuade others of its excellence. 
Another discovery on the same side deserves equal 
credit. Hippolytus alludes to a contention be- 
tween the two wings of the Valentinian school in 
these words: "The adherents of the Italiotic fao 



'250 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

tion, to which Herakleon and Ptolemy belong, say 
thus ; the adherents of the oriental faction, to 
which Axionikus and Bardesanes belong, thus." 
" Over this," he goes on to say, " they, and any 
body else who likes to, may quarrel." From this 
the inference is to be drawn not only that this 
"they" relates specifically to the above-mentioned 
heads of factions, but the word 'CTjretrcooav^ ." may 
quarrel," indicates that these persons were still 
living and contending at the time of Hippolytus. 
Who could doubt after applying this test that Mar- 
cion and Tertullian were contemporaries, since the 
latter writes, de carne Chr. : " On such grounds 
hast thou probably ventured to put out of the way 
so many original writings respecting Christ, Mar- 
cion, in order to disprove his existence in the iiesh. 
On what authority hast thou done this ? I ask. If 
thou art a prophet, then prophesy ; if an apostle, 
preach openly ; if a follower of the apostles, hold 
fist to them ; and if thou art a Christian, believe 
what is transmitted to us. But if thou art none 
of these, I might rightly say, then die, for thou art 
already dead; for thou canst not be a Christian if 
thou hast not the faith which makes one such." 

ISTote 70, p. 93. — See Euseb. Hist. Ecci. iv. 7 : 
iprfih (Agrippa Castor) avxbv elg ysv to svayyshov rea- 
aaga Ttoog roig eixo6i avvtd^ai. fiifikia. Even if nothing 
more definite is to be determined respecting the 
book of Basilides, it is a fact of weight that Agiip- 



NOTES* 251 

t 

pa Castor had already made use of the same ex- 
pression, from which we learn with certainty that 
some centuries later he indicated the collective 
character of our Gospels. 

Note 71, p. 96. — When the apostles were ask- 
ing whether it is better not to marry, the storv is 
that the Lord answered: "Not all can understand 
this, for there are eunuchs who are so from their 
birth, others are compelled to be so, and others 
still have made themselves eunuchs for the ever- 
lasting kingdom's sake." The last words are sup- 
plemented by what is found in Clemens. In like 
manner the same expression is cited by the Niko- 
laites in Epiphanius 25 : 6. Another extract found 
in Clemens "from the 23d book of the Exe^etica 
of Basilides," contains no passage, to be compared 
with this, nor does that in the Archelaus-disputa- 
tion. 

•Note 72, p. 98. — On this account he says, "Do 
not throw your pearls before swine, nor give that 
which is holy to the dogs." 

Note 73, p. 98. — That Jerome (in the pref. to 
Matt, and likewise in his translation of the- first 
Homily of Origen on Luke, according to Jerome, 
also, Ambrosius on Luke) mentions an original Gos- 
pel of Basilides, probably rests only upon the accept- 
ance of the 24 books of the Gospel as of a Gospel 



252. 



ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



in a certain sense apocryphal ; we must therefore 
consider the secret communications of Matthew, 
which according to Hippolytus were extolled by 
Basilides and his followers, as that Gospel of Basi- 

lides. 






Note 73, p. 96. — See vii. 25. " As it is written, 
'And the creation itself groan eth and travaileth 
together, waiting for the manifestation of the chil- 
dren of God.' " (Rom. yiii. 22 and 19.) " That is 
the . . . wisdom of which he says the Scripture 
asserts, ' Not with words which human wisdom 
teacheth, but which the Spirit teacheth.' " 1 Cor. 
ii. 13. Reference is made to the same in Eph. hi. 
3 and 5, and 2 Cor. xii. 4. 



Note 74, p. 96. — See vii. 26. " That is it, he 
says, which is written: 'The Holy Ghost shall 
come upon thee, . . . and the power of the Highest 
shall overshadow thee.' " The allusion to Matthew 
is in vii. 22, and relates to the account of the star 
seen by the wise men. 



Note 75, p. 96. — See vii. 20. " Basilides, there- 
fore, and Isodorus, Basilides' own son and disciple, 
assert that .Matthias transmitted to them cer- 
tain secret communications which he had received 
from the Saviour as a special charge. We shall 
see how openly Basilides as well as Isodorus and 
their whole crowd of followers calumniate not only 



NOTES. 253 

Matthias but the Saviour also." This is at the 
commencement of his representation of Basilides 
and his school. And just so often as he has occa- 
sion, in' what follows, to mention Basilides, he is to 
be understood as alluded to in the same strain as 
at the outset. 

Note 76, p. 98. — See Theodoret. Quaest. xlix. 
in libr. iv. Regum : " On this account I believe that 
the Ophites are called Naassenians." The only 
mention of the Ophites in Hippolytus is viii. 20 : El 
8s xai neocuriveg aiosascg ovoucCovrca Ka'n'ojr, 'OcfitoHv i] 
Noayah&v (Noayixcov ?) y.ca hsocov rotovrcop ovx dvayv.ai- 
ov rfp]\iai za in avrcov leyoueva § ynvusva tx&s'cd'ai, etc. 
From this there can scarcely any inference be 
drawn, except that to Hippolytus the name of 
Ophites seemed quite secondary compared with 
that of Naassenians. 

Note 77, p. 99. — The same division of the sen- 
tence is followed by many of our oldest textual 
documents, namely, the oldest patristic extracts. 

Note 78, p. 100. — -We do not add to the above 
all the peculiar Gnostic explanations appended to 
the' passages in the original. 
• 

Note 79, p. 100. — In connection wit'i these 
extracts we must call particular attention to the 
fact that they quite often unite a free transposition 






254: ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

of the text with a strictly close repetition of the 
words. They reveal in this a striking similarity to 
the citations of Justin. The same kind of quota- 
tions from Matthew and the other synoptic Gospels 
compel us to draw an immediate inference as to an 
extra-canonical source. Does not the analogy with 
these Gnostic and almost contemporaneous ex- 
tracts from John show how little such a hasty con- 
clusion as to the Justinian citation is justified? 
Or are we, in the case of the quotation given above 
from John vi. 53, to draw a conclusion as to that 
extra-canonical source, because, in entire analogy 
with Justin's quotation from John vi. 51, the con- 
cluding words, " ye shall not enter the kingdom of 
heaven," are given instead of John's "you have 
no life in you " ? 

Note 80, p. 102. — With reference to this, see , 
a previous note. Tertullian adv. Marcion, i. 19, 
writes : Cum igitur sub Antonino primus Marcion 
hunc deum induxerit. . . . The determination of 
dates in Mansion's works is a matter presenting 
the gravest difficulties. Although the "invaluit 
sub Aniceto " of Irenaeus hi. 4:3 is not to be ap- 
plied to his appearance at Rome, yet there is a 
contradiction still remaining involving a statement 
of Clemens (Strom, vii. 17), who places Marcion 
before Basilides and Valentine. As the latter 
position appears to be sustained by the recent 
striking discovery of a memorandum of Philastrius 



NOTES. 255 

(haer. 45, qui, i. e. Marcion, devictus at que fuga- 
tus a beato Johanne evangelista), ... so the same 
appears to be corroborated by the recent exhuming 
of the unquestionably ante- Jerome prologue to 
John, of which I shall have occasion to speak when 

1 come to the Papias problem. Manifestly we 
have to deal with a primitive tradition running 
back to a time antedating Marcion's earliest ac- 
tivity and his removal to Rome. 

Note 81, p. 103. — See Iren. hi. 2 and 12, where 

the assertion is made by the heresiarchs with 
specific reference to Marcion : Dicentes se . . . sin- 
ceram invenisse veritatem. Apostolos enim admis- 
cuisse ea quce sunt legalia Salvatoris verbis, (iii. 

2 : 2.) Et apostolos quidem adhuc qure sunt Ju- 
dseorum sentientes annuntiasse evangelium, se au- 
tem sinceriores et prudentiores apostolis esse. 
Unde et Marcion et qui ab eo sunt ad interciden- 
das conversi sunt scripturas, quasdam quidem in 
totum non cognoscentes, secundum Lucam autem 
evangelium et epistolas Pauli decurtantes, haee 
sola legitinia esse dicunt qua? ipsi minoraverunt. 
(iii. 12 : 12.) Similar words in Tert. adv. Marc. iv. 3. 
Sedenim Marcion nactus epistolain Pauli ad Galatas, 
etiam ipsos apostolos suggilantis ut non recto pede 
incedentes ad 'veritatem evangelii, simul et accu- 
sants pseudapostolos quosdam pervertentes evan- 
gelium Christi, Gonnititur ad destruenduni statum 
eorum evangeliorum, qu^e propria et sub apostolo- 






256 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

rum nomine edantur vel etiam apostolicorum, ut 
scilicet fidem quam illis adimit suo conferat. 

Note 82, p. 104. — See Iren. iii. 1:1 (also Eu- 
seb. Hist. Eccl. v. 8) : Et Lucas autem, sectator Pau- 
li, quod ab illo prsedicabatur evangelium in libro 
condidit. Tert. adv. Marc. iv. 5. Nam et Lucae 
digestum Paulo adscribere solent. In like man- 
ner Grig, in Euseb. Hist. Eccl. vi. 25 ; Eus. iii. 4 and 
Hier. de viris illustrib. cap. 7 : in all these three 
passages the assertion is distinctly made that it 
was then understood that Paul indicated Luke's 
Gospel when he spoke of his Gospel. Rom. ii. 16. 
Here belongs also Ps.-Orig. Dial, contr. Marcionit., 
sect. i. (Or. opp. ed. Delarue, vol. i. p. 808), where, to 
the question of the Orthodox man who asks, "Who 
wrote the Gospel of which thou sayest that it is the 
only one ? " the Marcionite replies, " Christ," and 
to the second question, " Did the Lord himself 
write ' I was crucified and rose again on the third 
day'?" the answer is, "That was added by the 
apostle Paul." 

Note 83, p. 105.— See A. Ritschl (Prof, at 
Gottingen) in the Jahrb. f. deutsch. Theol. 1866, 2. 
p. 355 : so is he (i. e. Prof. Teschendorf ) unable 
naturally to convince himself that in a remote 
province like Pontus there could not be without a 
degree of personal fault a more limited acquaint- 



notes. 257' 

ance with Christian books than in other provinces- 
of the church. 

Note 84, p. 105. — Had the Gospel of John ap- 
peared in Gottingen or in some other celebrated 
University-city of Germany, I should have been 
more able to take this charge home to myself. 

Note ■ 85, p. 106. — See Iren. i. 27 : 2 : Et super 
hgec id, quod est secundum Lucam evangelium cir- 
cumcidens etc. III. 12 : 12 : Uncle et Marcion et 
qui ab eo sunt . . . secundum Lucam autem evan- 
gelium et epistolas Pauli decurtantes. Tertull. 
adv. Marcion, iv. 2 : Ex iis quos habemus Lucam 
videtur Marcion elegisse quern, casderet. Porro 
Lucas non apostolus sed apostolicus. . . Ibid, iv. 
4 : Quod ergo pertinet ad evangelium interim Lu- 
cas, quatenus communio eius inter nos et Marcio- 
nem de veritate disceptat, adeo antiquius est quod 
est secundum nos. . . Si enim id evangelium quod 
Lucas refertur, penes nos (viderimus an et penes 
Marcionem) ipsum est quod Marcion per antitheses 
suas arguit, ut interpolatum a protectoribus Judais- 
mi . . . utique non jDotuisset arguere nisi quod in- 
venerat. Epiph. haer. xlii. 11. 



Note 86, p. 108. — See Tertull. adv. Marc. iv. 
Marcic 
auctorem. 



2: Marcion evang;elio scilicet suo nullum adscribit 



17 



258 ORIGIN' OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

Note 87, p. 108. — See a previous note. 

Note 88, p. 112. — See adv. Marc. iv. 5 : Cur non 
haee quoque (csetera evangelia) Marcion attigit, aut 
emendanda si adulterata, aut agnoscenda si Inte- 
gra ? Nani et competit ut, si qui evangelium per- 
vertebant, eorum magis curarent perversionem 
quorum sciebant auctoritatem receptiorem. Like- 
wise, De carne Chr. 2 : Rescindendo qiiod retro 
credidisti, sicut et ipse confiteris in quadam epis- 
tola. Directly before this we have, however, Tot 
originalia instrumenta Christi, Marcion, delere au- 
sus es. 

Note 89, p. 113. — See De carne Chr. 2, in the 
previous note ; see also adv. Marc. iv. 4. 

Note 90, p. 113. — See adv. Marc. iv. 4. Quid 
si nee epistolam agnoverint? 

Note 91, p. 113. — See Ritschl in Jahrb. fur 
deutshe Theol. i. a. 1. "The African was, however, 
great in his malicious perversion of the assertions of 
his heretical opponents, and whoever has followed 
the course of his onslaught upon Marcion must 
know how much he had to draw from Tertullian's 
expression, in order to establish the historical fact 
which he wanted to make good. If Marcion com- 
plained of the depravatio evangelii and gave him- 
self out as the -emendator evano-elii, he meant bv 



^otes. 259 

evangelium the regula ficlei, Christianity as a com- 
mon belief, which he wanted to purify from the 
Judaic additions made by the anti-Pauline school. 
And since Marcion did not defend the Gospel can- 
on which was known to Tertullian, the latter drew 
the inference that he was opposing the value of 
this collection on the ground of being a reformer 
of it. 

Note 92, p. 114. — See adv. Marc. iv. 4 : Emen- 
dator sane evangelii (this is consequently Tertul- 
lian's own statement, from which there is an effort 
to prove his misunderstanding of the matter) a 
Tiberianis usque ad Antoniana tempora everti 
Marcion solus et primus obvenit, exspectatus tarn 
diu a Christo, pcenitente iam quod apostolos pras- 
misisse properasset sine praesidio Marcionis; nisi 
quod humanse temeritatis, non divinse auctoritatis 
negotium est hseresis, quae sic semper emendat 
evangeiia dum vitiat. 

Note 93, p. 114. — Tbv ixh Ttaody.h^rov Movzavbv 
av/ovvtcg. 

Note 94, p. 118. — Alii vero ut donum spirit us 
frustrentur, quod in novissimis temporibus secun- 
dum placitum patris effusum est in humanum ge- 
nus, illam speciem (the account of the " quadri- 
forme evangelium" went before, to whose four 
"species" there is a subsequent reference) non ad- 



260 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

mittunt quae est secundum Johannis evangelium, 
in qua paracletum se missurum clominus promisit; 
seel simul et evangeliuui et prophetic urn repellunt 
spiritum. Infelices vere qui pseudoprophetas (a 
better reading assuredly than pseudoprophetas) 
quidem esse volunt, propheticam vero gratiam 
repellunt ab ecclesia; sinxilia patientes his, qui 
propter eos qui in hypocrisi veniunt etiam a fra- 
trum communication e se abstinent. 

Note 95, p. 118. — Otherwise the Montanists 
and their most decided followers onust have met in 
their rejection of the Gospel of John. There is 
not only no support for this view, involving as it 
does the grossest contradictions, but it contradicts 
as well what Hippolytus, Tertullian, and Eusebius 
have recorded respecting the connection of the 
Paraclete with the Montanist prophetic spirit. 
And had the Montanists thrown away the Gospel 
of John at the outset, how would it be clear that 
in Tertullian, the reformer of Montanism, we find 
(without the least trace of a contrast to the earlier 
Montanism) the Gospel of John standing in the 
closest connection with Montanism ? Besides, all 
which is expressed in the passage of Xrenaeus ap- 
plies just as appositely to the opponents of Mon- 
tanism, as it is inapposite and incomprehensible 
when it is made to refer to the Montanists. 

Note 96, p. 119. — Meander (Hist, of the Chris- 



NOTES. 261 

tian Church, 1856, 3d ed.) remarks in allusion to 
the Irenaeus passage, which he understands just as 
I do: "Irenaeus, from whom* we receive our first 
knowledge respecting this party [the Alogians], as- 
suredly says too much when he states that they 
rejected the Gospel of John in consequence of the 
passage relating to the Paraclete. That passage 
alone certainly coulcl not have led to this, for they 
only made use of it, as was the case with others, 
to limit it to the apostles, in order to take away 
the support from beneath the Montanists. But 
since they, if those words of Christ were brought 
against them with a Montanist interpretation, stig- 
matized the whole document which contained them 
as not genuine, the inference was a quick one that, 
in consequence of a kind of legerdemain only too 
common in theological discussion, they had in 
consequence of this passage rejected the whole 
Gospel/' 

Xote 97, p. 119. — Adv. Prax. 13, he says : Xos 
paracleti, non hominum discipuli. Comp. further 
De resurrect, earn. 63 (per novam prophetiam de 
paracleto inundantem), and inany other passages. 

Xote 98, p. 120. — Irenaeus states (hi. 3 : 4) 
that the story was repeated after Polycarp that 
John once encountered Cerinth while bathing, but 
instantly left the bath with these words, " Let us 
get out ; the bath might come to pieces with such 



262 O RIG IN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

an enemy to truth in it as Cerinth is." That two 
hundred years later Epiphanius attributed this 
anecdote to " Ebion " has no weight when set over 
against the authority of Xrenseus. For the state- 
ment of Epiphanius (hser. 28: 2) that Cerinth once 
had communication with Peter, and that he was 
one of those who criticised his relations with the 
Gentile centurion Cornelius, there is no earlier 
voucher. 

Note 99, p. 123. — According to 2: 27, Celsus 
suffers his Jews to be told that Christians changed 
and corrupted the " Gospel " for polemic ends. 

Note 100, p. 127. — Mary, poor, living by the 
work of her own hands, is said to have been driven 
away by her husband, a carpenter, in consequence 
of an adulterous connection with a soldier named 
Panthera ; and the story is that Jesus hired him- 
self in Egypt in consequence of his poverty, and 
learned secret arts there. 

Note 101, p. 127. — See Origen 2:13, where 
the Jew of Celsus says, "I might bring forward 
many things which were written of Jesus, and 
which are strictly true, though differing from the 
writings of the disciples ; yet I will leave this on 
one side." 

Note 102, p. 128. — See Der Ursprung unserer 
Evangelien, p. 80. 



NOTES. 263 

Xote 103, p. 126. — El ulr ovv om eyoaipsv. 



Xote 104, p. 129. — El de y.cl/.shvv aozduzvog 

ovreru.sae. 

Xote 105, p. 130. — That there is an allusion 
to the Marcionites does not do violence to this de- 
termination of the date ; still, mention is made of 
the heresy of Marcion as early as the first Apology 
of Justin. 

Xote 106, p. 132. — In 1851 appeared in the 
Hague a prize essay written by me in 1849 : De 
evangelior. apocryph. origine et usu. I hope to 
publish a revised edition of it for the use of learned 
readers. 

Xote 107, p. 134. — Those who care to go fur- 
ther into this matter I must beg to see in the orig- 
inal Greek how the passage runs in Justin, in Luke 
(i. 30 et sq.), and in the Prot evangel (see my elab- 
orately annotated Evang. Apocr. 1853, p. 21 et sq. 
Protevang. chap. xi.). 

Xote 108, p. 134. — Justin has it: The Spirit 
of the Lord shall come upon thee and the power 
of the Highest shall overshadow thee ; therefore 
that which shall be born of thee is holy, the Son 
of God. Luke says : The Holy Ghost shall come 
upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall 



264 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

overshadow thee; therefore also that holy thing 
which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son 
of God. The pseudo-James has it thus : For the 
power of the Lord shall overshadow thee ; there- 
fore shall the holy thing which is born of thee 
be called the Son of the Highest. 

Note 109, p. 135. — In Justin it runs : Tlianv ds 
xal %aQ<xv lafiovoa . . . aTtexQwaro, In the pseudo- 
James : Xagocv de Xafiovca MaQiap drtm Ttqog 'Eltod- 
/3ar. 

Note 110, p. 135. — See Hilgenfeld : Kritische 
Untersuchungen uber die Evangelien Justins, p. 
159 et sq. 

Note 111, p. 136. — See Epiph. haeres. xxvi. 12. 

Note 112, p. 137.- — Would one accept a closer 
relation between the Protevangelium and the 
Gnostic book of Mary, there would be a certain 
probability in giving the heretical Gnostic produc- 
tion such a dependence upon the half-Catholic book 
of James as is manifested in the many instances of 
extra-ecclesiastical literature depending upon that 
of the church. The hints given by Augustine in 
the twenty-third book against Faustus would also 
have weight in this regard, while those too of the 
Gnostic work called De generatione Marias have 
similar value. Mary was represented in this as 



NOTES. 265 

a daughter of a priest Joachim of the tribe of 
Levi. 

ISTote 113, p. 137. — See Orig. opp. ed. Delarue, 
iii. 463 (comm. in Matt. torn. x. 17). 

Note 114, p. 138. — For a full characterization 
of this matter, the passage from Hilgenfeld may 
have so much appositeness as to admit of its being 
quoted. " It is , certainly true that the present 
form of the Protevangel, while alluding to John 
and his parents without describing his birth more 
closely, is incomplete, and indicates more than it 
tells ; but since the Gnostics in their Fivva MaQiag 
gave an account of the dumbness which came upon 
Zacharias, the suspicion is not risked that the 
primitive draft of the Gospel contained an account 
of those antecedent events. The suspicion may 
not be ventured ; it is entirely without support. 
For the story of Zacharias's dumbness stands in the 
Gnostic production completely isolated ; it has not 
the slightest analogy either with Luke or with the 
Protevangel. If the latter points to something be- 
yond itself, it is at any rate clear that our canon- 
ical Gospels, including that of Luke, stand in the 
background. On the other hand, there is a close 
connection established with the Gnostic primitive 
form of the Protogospel : " the same is manifestly 
received only in a revision, worked over after the 
canonical Gospels mainly, causing it thereby to 



266 O RIG IX OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

lose, as it would seem, many of its peculiarities." 
But may not then the Book of James have a like 
close connection with the canonical Gospels, taking 
into account the agreement with them of its whole 
nature and purport ? Further on, we read : " The 
admission that Justin made use of such an ancient 
Protevangel may be allowed if it be held as prob- 
able that such aproduction, bearing among the Gnos- 
tics the title Fivva Maqlag^ contained a genealogy of 
Mary." After further remarks there follows : " All 
the more attractive therefore is another trace to 
which Origen leads us. In the passage where he 
alludes to the Gospel of Peter and the Protogospel 
of James, he speaks of them both as bearing the same 
testimony. But how would this be if both Gospels 
should prove to be closely related? How if in 
the Protogospel of James the prehminary history 
of Peter's Gospel — for there can scarcely be a 
doubt that there was such a preliminary history — 
were accepted ? Is not this more than building on 
the sand?" 

jSTote 115, p. 139. — The first reference to Jus- 
tin appears, as Hilgenfeld was the first to remark, 
in the document addressed to the congregations at 
Lyons and Vienna about the year 177. Allusion 
is made there (Eus. Hist. Eccl. v. 1 : 3, et sq.) to the 
martyrdom of Zacharias. Tertullian in the Scor- 
piacum contr. Gnosticos, chap. 8, refers to the same 
thing, only with more definite and positive Ian- 



NOTES. 267 

guage. Clemens Alexandr. alludes to the circum- 
stances connected with the midwives. Strom, vii. 
page 889 in Potter. Origen is the first who men- 
tions the w ork as the book of James. 

Note 116, p. 141. — We pass- over the story of 
the death of Zacharias in the Prot evangel to Matt. 
xxiii. 36. If this can be so understood as if afford- 
ing an historical basis for the passage in Mat- 
thew, it would strengthen the proof of the anti- 
quity of the Gospels which we derive from the doc- 
ument of James. 

Note 117, p. 143. — A third reference must be 
accepted in the thirty-eighth chapter, where he 
in like manner cites Is. Ixv. 2, and 1. 6 : "I gave 
my back to the smiters and exposed my cheeks to 
blows : " see also the words already cited of the 
xxii. Psalm, " They cast lots," etc., in conjunc- 
tion with Psalm iii. 5, " I laid me down and slept ; 
I awaked," etc., and Ps. xxii. 8. He makes this close 
to the prophecies : " and this was all done by the 
Jews to Christ, as you can learn " (here we have 
this express declaration) " from the Acts compiled 
under Pontius Pilate." 

Note 118, p. 144. — Instead of avaa we have 
the specific word vrto^v/juara. The same title, jDre- 
pared too for the official report of Pilate, appears 
in the Praesidial Acts relative to the martyrs Tara- 



268 ORIGIN- OF THE FOUR GOSPELS, 

chus, Probus and Andronikus. See my Evv. 
apocr. p. Ixii. In the same sense it is used in a 
homily inscribed to Chrysostom (Chrys. opp. torn. 
v. p. 942) and in the • Martyrium Ignatii, chap. iii. 
But with this we must reconcile the expression 
vTtoyLvriiiarwcu tcpr^egldsg, which Philo uses (de legat. 
ad Cajum 25) in reference to the reports which were 
sent by Alexander to the emperor of Rome. The 
oldest Latin title, found in Gregory of Tours, is the 
Gesta Pilati. 

Note 119, p. 145. — The thirty-eight years and. 
the healing on the Sabbath are taken from John's 
narrative, v. 2; that about the man who was 
carried by, from Matthew ix. 

Note 120, p. 146. — See Weitzel: Die christ- 
liche Passahfeier der drei ersten Jahrhunderte, p. 

248 et sq. 

Note 121, p. 147. — On scientific grounds it is 
not to be excused if one in learned investigations 
follows in the old rut and speaks of the Gospel of 
Nicodemus. Compare my re-establishing of the 
old title and the investigation respecting it in the 
Prolegomenon of the Evangelia apocrypha'; p. liv. 
et sq. It corresponds best with what was said 
above respecting the use of the word vrtoiivr^axa^ 
if we say the "Acts of Pilate." The Latin desig- 
nation, Gesta Pilati, also answers well to this. 



uroTES. 269 

Xote 122, p. 14S. — See Euseb. Hist. Eccl. ix. 

5 and 7. 

Xote 123. p. 149. — Comp. with reference to 
this my paper : Pilati circa Christum inclicio quid 
lucis afferatur ex aetis Pilati. Lipsiae, 1865. 

Xote 124, p. 149. — Of later writers Epipkanius 
admits (hteres. L. Quartodee. i.) that appeal was 
made to the Acts of Pilate in order to establish 
the time of Jesus' death, it being given there as 
the twenty-fifth of March. He adds, however, that 
he had found copies where the eighteenth was as- 
signed as the date. The first date is found also in 
our texts. 

Xote 125. p. 150. — See the two dvacpoQcu llad~ 

rev in our Evv. apocr. pp. 413-425. 

Xote 126. p. 150. — It will gratify the wish of 
the reader if I insert here a portion of the text of 
the work itself. TVe select for this purpose the 
whole of the third chapter, tinged as it is with the 
coloring of John : a And full of rage Pilate came 
forth from the hall of judgment (the Praetorium) 
and said to them. -I take the sun to witness that 
I find no fault in this man.' But the Jews an- 
swered and said to the governor, 'If this -man 
had not been a malefactor, we should not have de- 
livered him over to you. 3 Pilate answered. -Take 



270 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

him away and judge him after your law.' The 
Jews answered, * It is not permitted to us to put 
any one to death.' Pilate said, 'Did God order 
you not to put any one to death and not me as 
well?' Pilate went again into the judgment hall 
and called Jesus to him privately, and asked him, 
' Art thou the king of the Jews ? ' Jesus answered 
him, ' Speakest thou that of thyself, or have others 
told it thee?' Pilate answered Jesus, 'Am I a 
Jew ? Thy people and the high priest have de- 
livered thee over to me : what hast thou done ? ' 
Jesus answered, 'My kingdom is not of this 
world; for if my kingdom were of this world, then 
would my servants have fought that I should not 
be delivered over to the Jews: but now is my 
kingdom not thence.' Then spoke Pilate unto 
nnto him, ' Thou art a king, then.' Jesus an- 
swered him, ' Thou sayest that I am a king. For 
this cause was I born and am come into the world, 
that every one who is out of the truth may hear 
my voice.' Pilate asked, 'What is truth?' Jesus 
answered, i The truth is from heaven.' Pilate asked 
again, ' Is there no truth on the earth ? ' Jesus 
answered, i Thou seest how those who speak the 
truth are brought to judgment of those who have 
power on the earth.' " At the close of the fourth 
chapter we have: "But when Pilate saw the 
throng of Jews around him he perceived that 
many of the Jews were weeping, and said, 'Not 
all the people wish him to die.' Then answered 



NOTES, 271 

the elders, 'TTe, the whole people, have come, 
that he might be sentenced to death.' Pilate an- 
swers them, ' Wherefore should he die ? ' The 
Jews reply, £ Because he said he was God's son and 
a king.' " * 

Note 127, p. 151. — Compare respecting this 
my Evangelia Apocrypha in the Prolegg. i. p. xxxix. 
et sq. 

Xote 128, p. 152. — See the same work. 

Note 129, p. 153. — Comp. Hilgenfeld: Kritisehe 
Untersuchungen iiber die Evv. Justins, der Clemen- 
tinischen Homilien und Marcions, 1850 (therefore 
before 1853), p. 387 et sq. Here an effort is ascribed 
to the fourth Evangelist to subordinate Peter to the 
beloved disciple, and on this account the fourth 
Evangelist's independence of Peter's Gospel is ad- 
mitted, but afterwards every proof favoring the use 
of the Gospel of John is denied to the connection 
of the homilies with him. (Page 346 had thus de- 
cided with respect to the expression, Horn. 3 : 52, 
^^SLy sheep hear my voice": "It is a question 
whether the Gos|3el of John or one still older con- 
-tained this passage.'*) "Against such a use,'' it goes 
on literally to say. "stands the glaring difference in 
the tendency of both writers, so that in presuppos- 
ing an acquaintance with this Gospel one must ad- 
mit a polemic objective view. Let one imagine 



272 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

an attack made upon the divinity of Christ, and 
satisfy himself how such an author could dispose of 
John i. 1 ; x. 33, et sq. ; xx. 28. While, in John 
x. 36, Jesus declares himself substantially as the 
Son of God, so that his own assertion is an expres- 
sion of his divinity, the author of the Homilies 
takes the same expression, 16 : 15, to be a decisive 
statement of the difference between Jesus and the 
Deity. The Lord never declared himself to be 
God, but the Son of God. How was it pos- 
sible, after using the fourth Gospel, to expressly 
limit the time of the intercourse of Jesus and the 
disciples to a single year, and not, as later teachers 
have accepted, the time of his public career ? How 
could he besides, while declaring Peter to be the 
first fruits and cherished disciple of Christ, so 
markedly leave out the Johannean portraiture, 
and among the expressions used by Jesus regard- 
ing the devil (xix. 2), which he doubtless collects as 
completely as was possible, how could he omit such 
an expression as John viii. 44? The result of our 
investigation is in a word this, that even in Clem- 
entine's Homilies the Gospel of Peter, in contradis- 
tinction to Justin and some farther continuations, 
is used; with him Matthew, perhaps Luke also, 
but certainly not the Gospel of John." 

Note 130, p. 154. — With the utmost prob- 
ability Celsus made use (about 150) of the epistle 
of Barnabas. That he specifically speaks of the 



NOTES. 273 

apostles as Ttovijooxaxo^ Origen infers (contr. Cels. 
i. 63) from the use of the epistle. 

Note 131, p. 156. — The text however is not 
to be judged from what is published, nor is that of 
Dr. Hilgenfeld, who has contented himself with un- 
scientifically repeating it just as it was left in the 
edition of two hundred years ago. 

Note 132, p. 160.— See Beitrage i. a. L: "These 
words do not suit if they be made with Orelli (Se- 
lecta pp. eccl. capita, etc.) to refer to the apocry- 
phal fourth book of Ezra which Barnabas else- 
where cites." One would draw the inference from 
this which Volkmar insists should be deduced 
from Credner' s words, quite in antagonism to what 
Credner himself asserts. 

Note 133, p. 160. — See Volkmar: Index lectt. 
in liter, univ. Turic. 1864, page 16. Scriptum est 
apud Esdram Prophet am iv. Esd. viii. 3 : " multi cre- 
ati, pauci autem salvati." Hoc auctor confudit cum 
dicto Christi apud Matth. xix. 30, (?) Christiano 
illo interpretamento dicti Esdrani. Quod ed. mea 
Esdras Propheta3, 1863, p. 290, post J. C. de Orelli 
et C. A. Crednerum (how do the words of Credner 
himself, cited in the previous note, agree with this?) 
. quorum meritum plerisque in memoriam revocan- 
dum erat, demonstravit, omnibus qui hucusque de 
ea re ex ed. mea iudicarunt, persuasit. . . . 



274 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

Note 134, p. 160.— See D. F. Strauss, Das Le- 

ben Jesu, p. 55. 

Note 185, p. 160. — Volkmar (Der TTrsprung 
unserer Evv. p. 161)' assigns the date of this work 
to " 97, harvest time." 

Note 136, p. 161. — The statement given above 
of the heathen scoffer Celsus merits unquestionable 
pre-eminence over this discovery; for according 
to him the expression, "It is easier for a camel to 
go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man 
to enter into the kingdom of God," is but another 
form of Plato's "It is impossible that he who is 
extraordinarily rich should be extraordinarily 
good." See Origen contr. Cels. 6:16. As for 
other matters, however, the crafty trickery of Volk- 
mar does not derive any reflected credit from Re- 
nan, as it was said to do in the earlier editions of 
this work ; it should have the claim allowed it of 
having anticipated Renan, since the latter work 
appeared in 1863, whereas Volkmar's preface to 
" Esdra Propheta" is dated October, 1862. Honor 
to whom honor is due. 

Note 137, p. 161. — So Volkmar i. a. 1. p. 161. 
"118-119 Alexandrine epistle named after Barna- 
bas, with a knowledge of the Gospel of Matt, as a 
new work with the most ample use of Matthew, but 



NOTES. 275 

with the sayings of Christ taken only from the hal- 
lowed Old Testament." 

Note 138, p. 162. — A later affix with Matt, 
than with Barnabas is "to repentance." 

Note 139, p. 162. — By this I seek to render 
literally trtu ovv fiellovaiv )Jyetv. 

Note 140, p. 163. — Not less than in Barnabas 
does it become clear in Justin that he makes the 
brazen serpent of John's . Gospel the type of the 
cross. Even Justin's expression, Dial. 91, appeared 
to have flowed from a recollection of John : IIqog- 
q)Svyovat tw xov t6xavoco{jJvov vtov avxov Tt^wavxi sig 
xov xoGfxov, for John iii. 17, ov yao drt^oxeilev 6 d~eog 
xov vlov avrov elg xov -a6(j[aov^ is closely connected 
with iii. 14. Naturally, with Barnabas there is the 
same process of divination applied that we find 
earlier among the Clementines. So Volkmar i. a. 
1. p. 67 : The author " seems not to depend at all 
upon the Sap. Sal. 16 : 5, which had already pre- 
figured the typical character of the serpent. But 
least of all upon the Logos Gospel (John iii. 14), 
for his special comparison of the lifting up of the 
serpent in the wilderness with the lifting up of 
Christ (on the cross and thus to the heaven) is 
wanting here : and how could one who in this con- 
nection read ' in order that every one who should 
believe in him should not perish, but have ever- 



276 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

lasting life ' discard such a saying as the above.? 
No one of us (!) could do it." In the same fashion 
Volkmar shows in his Append, to Credner's Gesch. 
des Neutest, Kanons (I860, p. 372) that Tertullian 
had not been acquainted with the first Epistle of 
Peter, or, if he could not deny to Tertullian acquain- 
tance with the work Adv.- Gnosticos, asserts that it 
was only subsequently to 207 that he was familiar 
with it. He writes, " What apt proofs it (the epis- 
tle) offers to the opponent of the Gnosis de resurr. 
earn. . . . the Montanist moralist even, de pudicit. 
... or de habitu mulier. . . . How was he able 
to jmss over Peter in the letter, when going 
through the entire list of prophets and apostles ? 
An Epistola Petri has no place in his Instru- 
mentum Apostolorum, as he draws it up in both 
its chief forms." Pity that that whole course of 
acute reasoning finds its answer in the fact (as Dr. 
Aberle has already shown in the Theol. Quartal- 
schrift, 1864, 1) that its first propounder has over- 
looked Tertullian's complete work, De oratione, 
where (Semler, p. 15, chap, xiv.) express reference 
is made to the " prsescriptio Petri," in 1 Pet. iii. 

iSTote 141, p. 166. — Irena3iis says (hser. iii. 3: 4 
and ii. 22: 5) that he lived in Trajan's day, 98 to 
117. Eusebius (in the Chronicon) sets his death 
at the year 100, and Jerome (de viris illustrib. and 
elsewhere) 68 years after the death of Christ. 



xotes. 277 

The Chronic. Pasch. has 72 years after the ascen- 
sion of Christ. 

Note 142, p. 169. — -The change of arrange- 
ment in several of our oldest Itala manuscripts 
(Matthew, John, Luke, Mark) does not rest on a 
chronological basis, but, according to Tertullian, 
upon the connection, first of the two men who 
were apostles, then of those who were helpers of 
the apostles. 

Note 143, p. 171. — This is in accord with the 
statement of Eusebius iii. 37 : 2, that already at 
Trajan's time (98 to 117) apart of the missionary ac- 
tivity inspired by Christianity consisted in the dif- 
fusion of the written gospel narratives (xal trjv twv 
fieicov evayyslicov TtctQadidovai yQa<$i(v). 

Note 144, p. 171. — Aoymv xvgiaxcov thjyrfiig. 
Rufin, following the ancient usage, translates loyia 
by oracula. It is extremely probable that the book 
of Papias, true to the chiliastic standpoint of the man, 
was largely devoted to the prophecies of the Lord. 
Christian usage, however, gave the word a larger 
significance, so that the sayings of the Lord and of 
the apostles, although not having the precise char- 
acter of prophecy, are yet called by that name, 
and the Holy Writ was designated as &eia loyia. 
Papias makes use of the same "expression in con- 
veying a notion of the contents of the Gospels of 



78 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 



Matthew and Mark, where the narrower concep- 
tion conveyed in the word " prophecy n does not 
do justice to the meaning. 

Note 145, p. 172. — Tag Ttaod tov xvqiov rrj rtiGxei 
dedopsvag xcu an avtrjg rtaoayivo\iivag rrjg dXrfteiag. 

Note 146, p. 173. — Tovg rwv TtQeafivreQcov dviv.qivov 
Tioyovg, n Avhqiag // ri Ilstgog sifter . . . a re Aqigtilqv 
xai 6 Ttoeofivr. 'Iwavv. ol rov xvq. yiafiryzai IJyovaiv. 

Note 147, p. 174. — Tovg fuv rwv dart. Xoyovg 
Ttaoa roov avroTg 7taqry/,olov#ry/.oxwv byioloyelTtaQeihjtyiv 
au 'Aotartoovog de kcu rov TToeafivr. 'loo. avripoov savtov 
cprjai yevsG&GU. 

Note 148, p. 176. — To understand who these 
presbyters were, it is not necessary to understand 
that they were personally connected with the im- 
mediate companions of the apostles, as Irenaeus 
(iv. 27 : 1) shows : Quemadmodum auclivi a quo- 
dam presbytero (later it runs : in quit ille senior) 
qui audierat ab his qui apostolos viderant et ab his 
qui didicerant. But Irenaeus (v. 36 : 2) refers to 
the " presbyters " without any additional designa- 
tion. 

Note 149, p. 176. — As witness to his existence, 
Dionysius of Alexandria (232, superintendent of 
the Alexandrine School of Catechumens) quotes 



NOTES, 279 

in Euseb. vii. 25 : 6 the mere fact that there were 
two monuments at Ephesus inscribed with the 
name of John, and Eusebius busies himself (hi. 29) 
more closely with attempting to give more weight 
to the testimony of Papias to the existence of the 
se'cond John ; in support of which he brings for- 
ward, evidently following the lead of Dionysius, 
the existence of the two Johannean monuments at 
Ephesus. 

^note 150, p. 180. — In the last passage we 
have %k loyia without any further designation ; he 
refers however to what goes before, where we 
have rcov xvQiaxtav ioyicov. 

Note 151, p. 185. — Eusebius speaks of Papias 
even at the time of Trajan. 

Note 152, p. 187. — The memorandum in a 
Latin Oxford codex of the fourteenth century, re- 
specting the four Marys, on whose margin is writ- 
ten the word Papias, is unquestionably to be re- 
ferred to a Papias of the middle ages, if there is 
any meaning to be ascribed to marginal words. 
In such excerpts, particularly as they are given in 
the Catenas and similar works, the addition of the 
authors name is a matter of the greatest untrust- 
worthiness. 

Note 153, p. 189. — So e. g. Zeller : "The si- 



280 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

lence of Papias will always afford conclusive evi- 
dence against the authenticity of the Gospel of 
John." Theol. Jahrb. 1847, p. 199. Hilgenfeld: 
" Had Papias said the least thing respecting a Gos- 
pel of John, Eusebius could not possibly have over- 
looked it, and as he examined into the works trans- 
mitted by John, he could not have kept silence had 
there existed a written Gospel from his hand. Die 
Evangelien, p. 344. Strauss : " The silence of Pa- 
pias respecting John as the author of this Gos- 
pel is the more weighty in that he not only ex- 
pressly assures us that he has carefully looked into 
what was left behind by John, but that, as the 
bishop of Asia Minor and' an acquaintance of Poly- 
carp, the disciple of John, he would consequently 
know something more definitely respecting the 
apostle, who spent his later years in Ephesus." 
Leben Jesu, p. 62. Renan : " Papias, qui avait re- 
cueilli avec passion le& recits oraux de cet Aristion 
et de ce Presbyteros Joannes, ne clit pas un mot 
d'une Vie de Jesus ecrite par Jean. Si une telle 
mention se flit trouvee dans son ouvrage, Eusebe, 
qui releve chez ltd tout ce qui sert a l'histoire lit- 
teraire du siecle apostolique, en eut sans aueun 
doute fait la remarque." Vie de Jesus, 3d ed. 1863, 
p. xxiv. Volkmar : " We may therefore certainly 
presuppose that had Eusebius found a trace of the 
use of the anti-chili a stic Gospel of Papias he would 
all the more eagerly have brought it out ; " and this 
opinion is preceded by the remark that "Papias 



XOTES. 281 

edited his collection and interpretation of the 
Lord's prophecies about the year 167 of our era." 
TJrsprung uns. Evv. p. 59. 

Xote 154, p. 191. — 'OTtoiaig xtyjQrprau rcor arn- 
).eyotmwi\ lira xe Tteoi rcior Evdia&rjXGW y.at ouo/.Gyovut- 
rm> ygaqcor xal ooa TtSQi rcor ur t xoiovtcqv cdrou ei'mjai. 

Xote 155, p. 192. — That 1 John and 1 Peter can 
not be taken out of this category Eusebius himself 
declares, vi. 14, when he speaks of Clement. (See 
text immediately following.) From the represen- 
tation of Cosmas Indicopleustes in the seventh 
book of his Topographia Christiana we learn in 
like manner that the authenticity of all the catho- 
lic epistles was contended against. 

Xote 156, p. 196. — The statement of Andrew 
in the sixth book that Papias bore witness to the 
trustworthiness (to ahoTticxor) of the Apocalypse 
neither coincides with the assertion that Eusebius 
overlooked the testimony borne to the Johannean 
Apocalypse by Papias, nor, still less, with the sus- 
picion uttered by Volkmar (p. 59) that Eusebius 
passed over this evidence " on account of his par- 
tisan feeling against the Apocalypse."' It is de- 
cisive against this suspicion that Eusebius has men- 
tioned Justin and Theophilus as credible witnesses 
for the Apocalypse. 



282 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

Note 157, p. 197. — Hilgenfeld sought to take 
away the force of this proof, and wrote in his jour- 
nal, 1865, pt. 3, p. 335: "Manifestly it is quite a 
different thing if Eusebius does not hold,* in regard 
to the epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, the 
testimony in behalf of the epistle of Paul to .this 
community, an epistle which is unquestionabty 
Pauline in its origin ; and merely remarks, though 
expressly, the use of the first epistle of Peter, which, 
although a subject of dispute, unquestionably be- 
longed to the much contested catholic epistles." 
In more prudent fashion, however, Hilgenfeld men- 
tions to his readers the epistle to the Philippians 
merely, to whom Polycarp himself writes, and does 
not mention that the extracts are taken from many 
other Pauline letters. 

Note 158, p. 195. — As lately as 1865, Hilgen- 
feld wrote : " How can the inference be drawn 
otherwise than that Eusebius searched carefully in 
Papias also for all evidences of New Testament 
writings, and failed to communicate anything re- 
specting the canonical fourfoldness of the Gospels, 
and especially respecting the Gospel of John, only 
because he found no evidence ? " " Who does not 
see that the fourfoldness of the canonical gospels 
had no existence at the time of Papias?" 

Note 159, p. 198. — See Volkmar i. a, 1. p. 61: 
" It is an entire distortion of the case for Tischen- 



xotes. 283 

dorf to try to trouble rae with the £ absurdity ' of the 
notion that Papias knew nothing of Luke as well : he 
may just as well have been acquainted with Luke's 
Gospel as with John's, but may have looked down 
upon both as too free, Paul-like, anti-Judaic-Chris- 
tian and anti-chiliastic." " Although he does not de- 
fend himself exactly so in respect to the Gospel of 
Luke, the reason is that it was not enough held in 
common regard as Luco-Pauiine, and he did not need 
his millenary traditions to defend himself against 
such a non-authority. What follows, therefore, from 
this nearer examination of the Papias contexts in re- 
lation to the Gospel of the Spirit's Parusia ? Either 
he really did not become acquainted with it in 
his own. Hierapolis, or he did not discover it with 
the superscription ' according to John,' and cer- 
tainly not having canonical authority to be dis- 
owned by his silence. His testimony remains there- 
fore unchanged ; it must be taken without evasion. 
Papias's silence respecting Luke and John does not 
bear direct witness indeed for the non-existence of 
their Gospels, but for their non-apostolical authori- 
ty ; or rather that both Gos]3els were without apos- 
tolical authority with the larger number of contem- 
poraries for whom Papias gathered and expounded 
his chiliastic traditions." 

Xote 160, p. 199. — During my recent visit to 
Rome (March, 1866), Cardinal Pitra, the learned 
Benedictine, called my attention to this manu- 



284 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

script ; yet Cardinal Jos. Mar. Thomasius had al- 
ready given place to the prologue accompanying 
it in his collections (Opp. omnia, torn. i. Rome, 
1747, p. 344), where Dr. Aberle of Tubingen had 
noticed it, and learnedly discussed it in the first 
number of his Quarterly, 1864, pp. 1-47. 

Note 161, p. 200. — It is further stated: Dis- 
scripsit vero evangelium dictante lohanne recte. 
That the writer of this prologue wanted that this 
should be understood of John, the prologue pre- 
fixed to the Greek Catena text to John, and edited 
by Corderius, proves, which runs thus : vrtayoQEvas 
(sic) to evayy. rep savtov [Aa&tjTrj Tlajtlci svfiiCQZw rep Is- 
QaTtolirr^ It is clear that this traditional statement is 
not to be reconciled with Eusebius. Directly sub- 
sequently in the prologue it runs : Verum Marcion 
hereticus cum ab eo (codex abe) fuisset improbatus, 
eo quod contraria sentiebat, abiectus est a lohanne. 
Is vero scripta aut epistolas ad eum pertulerat a 
fratribus qui in ponto fuerunt. It has already 
been stated that this tradition respecting Marcion 
is not an isolated one. 

Note 162, p. 200. — III. 36: 1 is Presbyteri; di- 
rectly after: Dicunt presbyteri apostolorum disci- 
puli; and shortly before, in connection with the ac- 
count of the reign of a thousand years : Presbyteri 
qui Johannem disci pulum domini viderunt. 



xotes. 285 

Xote 163, p. 207. — It has had a great many 
stadia to run through from its ancient use down to 
the present use by the Romish Church. After 
goingr through several hands in the third and fourth 
centuries, and after repeatedly undergoing revis- 
ions in accord with the Greek text, Jerome formed 
his text from it, not without reference moreover to 
Greek authorities which were allied to it. The use 
of the Romish Church gradually made this the Vul- 
gate. It had, however, experienced many modifi- 
cations, when the Roman Curia, towards the end 
of the sixteenth century, took advantage of the 
general diffusion of manuscripts to execute an of- 
ficial revision of the Vulgate, and it is this which 
now is authorized in the Roman Catholic Church. 

Note 164, p. 211. — It is an interesting memo- 
rial of the negative school of criticism at the pres- 
ent day, that its representatives, in part at least, 
take particular pleasure in basing their defense up- 
on just those weighty scripture passages respecting 
whose want of authenticity the criticism which ad- 
heres closely to documentary evidence, as gained 
from the most recent discoveries, leaves no doubt 
at all. Among such passages may be reckoned 
the close of Mark's Gospel, the narrative respect- 
ing the adulteress in John, and the story of the 
descent of the angel into the pool of Bethesda in 
the fourth verse of the fifth chapter of the same 
GospeL Certainly there can be no doubt that it 



286 ORIGIN OF THE FOUR GOSPELS. 

far better subserves the ends opposed to apologet- 
ics to leave such apocryphal passages as these in 
both the Gospels mentioned, than by their omis- 
sion to seem to give advantage to those who claim 
the apostolical origin of those Gospels. That that 
alliance between legitimism and its most deter- 
mined opponents repeats itself on a political field, 
argues a wicked misunderstanding on the part of 
scholars of reputed orthodoxy. » 

Note 165, p. 214. — Tag Xoutag ypacpag in this 
connection must be referred to other New Testa- 
ment Scriptures. If those of the Old Testament 
were meant, the Pauline epistles would here be 
clearly placed upon the same footing with the Old 
Testament. 

Note 166, p. 214. — Verse 25, ^against whose 
genuineness most serious objections have long been 
expressed, has now in the primitive Codex Sina- 
iticus the most weighty authority against itself. 
(It has been an error that down to this time Cod. 
63 has been cited in the same sense.) 

Note 167, p. 214. — For the purpose of super- 
seding Grabe's extremely imperfect edition of 
this important work, I have long been making the 
requisite preparations in the English and French 
libraries. It was my good fortune to discover in 



NOTES. 287 

1844 an entirely unknown manuscript bearing on 
this matter, in the island of Patmos. 

Xotz 168, p. 215. — We can understand the re- 
mark of I. Xitzsch in 1810 (de Testam. xii. Pa- 
triarch, etc. Conini. critica, p. 17), that the author 
of this Testament could not have lived in the first 
century, since he alluded to almost all the books 
of the Xew Testament. "Si ante casum Hieroso- 
lyinoruni floruisset, hunc non tarn diserte indicas- 
set ; sin omnino sasculo primo, non cognovisset ad 
quos fere omnes allusit Xovi Testamenti libros ." 






Q 



tl.9 



<~» n \ .j 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: June 2005 

PreservationTechnoloqies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, Pa 16066 
(724)779-2111 



VSJLk 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




4 384 523 % 



